5 Ways to Keep up to Date with the Health Industry as a General Practice Doctor
5 Ways to Keep up as a General Practice Doctor
Check out these five ways to keep up to date with the health industry as a general practice doctor. Click here for more information on the subject!
In just about every industry, leaders and vanguards will preach the value of professional development.
Even if you’re a general practice doctor who thinks that not a lot has changed in the last few years, you might be surprised to find out what’s new in your field. As a doctor, you should always be learning and keeping yourself up to date with what’s happening inside of the medical industry.
Here are five ways to ensure you always stay up to date with what’s going on.
1. Talk with Your Team
While you might think you need to be constantly tuned into what’s going on via online channels and medical journals, anyone in general practice could be helpful. You could get useful information from anyone who practices with you. Your colleagues are just as tuned in to the industry as you are and could have lots of new things to share with you.
The health industry is constantly changing, from new practice methods, new approaches to patient care, and the use of therapy in the medical field. With the wide variety of healthcare jobs in Ireland, you could be seeing new approaches to old problems all of the time.
You don’t need to have a meeting to get this information. It can come as an answer to a question you ask a colleague over coffee or at lunch. Pay attention to practice and clinical meetings as well. You never know what you could learn.
2. Conferences and Courses Aren’t Just Vacations
If you spend a lot of time at conferences, don’t use them as an excuse to just sleep in and kick your feet up. While you work hard as a med doc, you need to make the most of the chance to be around your peers.
Next time there’s a local or national course offered, check into what you could get out of them. You never know what new information or techniques could be offered.
While you need to keep your eyes open for sponsored meetings that might be pushing a product or a medication, you could still get some useful info. You never know what a conference, course, or lecture has to offer until you take the time to sit down and listen.
Study days are a common way to learn what’s new in family medicine. While the information you get might not be radically different from what you know, always be sure to read between the lines. There could be major changes in your industry coming down the pike and being able to predict them is valuable.
3. Try Some E-Learning Methods
There are modules being created for practitioners every day. From midwife, to nurse, to general practitioner, there are courses catering to every role under the sun with the aim to make you better at your job.
Don’t bother paying for a course until you figure out whether or not you can get anything from learning online. Taking courses online isn’t for everyone and some people struggle to focus, especially after a long day of running a practice.
There’s no shortage of internet resources but be sure to go with a resource that you trust. Try a nationally recognized and peer-reviewed sources for information rather than the first for practice company that you come across. The right course could introduce you to a whole new methodology that could drastically change the kind of care you offer your patients.
4. Reading
While it seems simple enough, just finding the time to read journals and recent papers is hard to come by. Once you head home for the day, it’s tempting to check out and enjoy yourself for the rest of the day. However, if you’re a person who is generally curious about your field, you should have no trouble finding time to read.
There’s no drought of well-researched and reputable journals available. In every file, there are dozens or hundreds of niches that different researchers take on. Find some practitioners who you trust and who you want to learn from.
Follow what your favourite researchers do and look out for books they put out. Getting an immersive deep dive from your favourite authors could give you a totally new perspective on your favourite aspect of your general practice.
You can search through decades of archived material on just about every website. You’ll find out about new guidelines that are being discussed around the world in peer support networks and in clinical meetings.
5. Skill-building Clinics
In just about every major institution on the planet, there are skill-building clinics being held. Even if you’ve got the knowledge to aid in a crisis, without practice, you can lose those skills. Basic life support skills require constant practice so that you know what to do in case of an emergency.
Beyond your regular updates to hands-on training for CPR or mouth-to-mouth, there are lots of new skills to learn. Even minor surgery requirements have been changed in recent years. While general practice doctors don’t perform much minor surgery, it’s important to practice the skills that you have whenever possible.
Because of changes to requirements, some general practitioners don’t even perform surgery anymore. Rather than lose an important skill, you should improve on your abilities as a medical professional and learn how to properly perform minor surgery.
A General Practice Doctor Can Get Rusty
Even the most highly skilled general practice doctor can get a little bit tired over time. Bad habits will take over where accurate skills once were and you could find yourself losing your grip on how to stay ahead. If you pay attention to what’s going on in your field, you can always be one step ahead of your colleagues and even offer value to them.
If you want to ensure you can maintain your work-life balance while growing your skills, check out our guide for more info.
