Seth Kinast’s Blog

Part of a good application to medical school is showing that you have real medical experience. They want to be sure that you know what you’re getting into before you apply. I’ve been to Africa and Mexico on medical trips, have shadowed in Joplin’s ER, and followed a couple of Freeman’s doctors around, but wanted to get real volunteering hours as well. So I applied to volunteer at Norman’s hospital, NRHS, to do stuff in the Emergency Department. I had to go in for an entire afternoon of training, and take tests and buy a uniform and all sorts of stuff. I assumed I’d be making beds and pulling charts and such. But little did I know. I sent this e-mail off this morning:

Mrs. Williford,

My name is Seth Kinast and I attended the spring training session for College Volunteers. I signed up for the Friday spot from 3-6 p.m., and went in for the first time this past Friday, the 22nd of February. I am writing because of the extremely poor experience I had, in hopes that you can either provide a solution, or assist me in switching my volunteer time to another slot.

I arrived for my 3 p.m. shift at about 2:40 p.m. and checked in at the front desk. I made my way to the ED and talked to one of the ladies at the front ED desk, explaining that I was there for the College Volunteer program. She went and found “Robbie”, who was apparently the person in charge of showing the volunteers around.

I explained to Robbie that I was here for the 3-6 shift but was a little early to make sure I found where I was supposed to be in time. The first thing he said to me was “Well I guess you’re just a kiss-a**, huh?” I am unsure why arriving early would ever be viewed negatively, but overlooked this remark as perhaps just being Robbie’s personality. However, over the next hour or so, he made several more offensive remarks, including what happened to him when he smoked marijuana “I just wanna f***, eat, and sleep” and asking if I had a “hot sister” that he could get to know. I do not consider these comments to be representative of a professional staff member.

I could have overlooked the commentary, however, had the rest of my shift been rewarding. Soon after I arrived, Robbie took me into a back utility room where two ED techs were sanitizing equipment. One of the techs was training the other and both were obviously busy. Robbie left me with the techs– “maybe you can learn something”– but the techs had little time to do anything but make polite conversation. (No foul; they were doing their jobs.) The techs left for another floor and suggested that I wait behind in the ED. I went to the break room to find Robbie eating cherry cobbler and ice cream. I asked him “who can you put me with now?” since the techs were gone. “Oh, no one,” he responded. He kept talking for a couple more minutes to one of the nurses and then left the ED completely. He did not tell me where he went nor when he would return. I stood around awkwardly for awhile, trying to stay out of the way; I didn’t want to start bothering nurses or others who were obviously busy and had jobs to do. After Robbie did not return, I gave up and left in frustration. This was about 4:45 p.m.

My experience in the ED left me feeling not only unneeded, but unwelcome in general. I do not look forward to returning this Friday if I will simply be ignored again. Please let me know if I’ve perhaps just hit a bad shift of downtime, where college volunteers are not needed; I would be happy to move to another shift. Alternatively, please let me know if the problem I am having can be resolved. In any case, I would request that you let me know as soon as possible what can be done. I have already invested considerable time, money, and effort in becoming a College Volunteer for NRHS– I sincerely hope that something can be done so both NRHS and myself can benefit from my time spent in the ED, but am willing to start looking for an alternative volunteering job if the situation is unlikely to change.

You can contact me at «redacted» or by e-mail at «redacted». Thank you very much for your time and attention.

Seth Kinast

Sigh.