Why a wiki?

Why a wiki?

The wiki sight that has been developed for the Health Careers Education classes might be used in several different ways. The first might be to have the students provide feedback to each other and the instructor, about how they might respond to patients in different situations. A patient that has just been given a terminal diagnosis, has just lost a limb because of an infection, or one that has been diagnosed with a chronic illness that requires life style changes are just a few examples. Because of the age of our students, many have not had a lot of life experience to appropriately deal with their patient. A wiki could be developed to provide feedback, insight and a little bit of education. Another way to use the wiki is to improve the students’ medical documentation skills. Having he opportunity to have students edit their documentation is much less intimidating than having the instructor or other medical professional review it. The ability to see who made changes or offered communication ideas would benefit the instructor by identifying those students that still need help, or are on top of their game. I believe in these situations the benefits would far outweigh the challenges of using a wiki. It would be good to see the feedback that the students are providing for each other. It would also be beneficial to see how the students are dealing with the pressures and stresses of working around ill and/or elderly patients.