A pair of South Carolina beach volleyball student-athletes are trading in the sand for scrubs as they take part in the Athletics Department’s Beyond Sports Professional Development and Summer Internship program. Rising senior Chase Teal and rising junior Jolie Cranford are getting valuable experience in their internships through Prisma Health.
“I’m at the Richland campus for Prisma Health working as a nurse extern,” said Teal, who will graduate in December with a nursing degree. “I’ve said for my entire life that I want to be a pediatric nurse, but right now, I’m doing a rotation in cardiac, and I love it. I just finished my first rotation at the heart hospital. I’ve been paired with a nurse on that floor, and it’s a lot of learning about what the role of a registered nurse is every day. It’s three 12-hour shifts, which is the normal nursing schedule. It is definitely some long days! It has been awesome! My next rotation is in the children’s hospital.”
“I’m primarily in the orthopedic pediatric physical therapy center, and I hop around a little bit,” said Cranford, who also plays on the indoor volleyball team and is studying exercise science. “I’m considering going to physical therapy school or physician’s assistant school post-graduation. I shadow a bunch of different physicians within the medical field, so it will help me decide what I want to do. I was interested in the medical field because I think it is important to be educated about our bodies and how they function, I wanted to be in a career that helps people, and science has always been the most interesting to me! I’ve always been fascinated by learning how things work, and specific interest in the human body.”
One of the key elements of the internship is hands-on experience.
“My supervisor has a plan for all the kids that come in,” Cranford said. “She’ll tell me the exercise they are supposed to do. Then I’ll help them pick out a toy. They’re very creative in the ways they get them to do the exercises. I didn’t know how much physical therapy is focused on lower extremities. On Thursdays, I’m in the office doing casting with the kids where I help out with the materials, appointments, scheduling, and things like that. On Tuesdays, some of the patients in pediatrics go into the sports med lab with one of the doctors that works with the student-athletes at South Carolina. I’ll also shadow some physician’s assistants, and later I will…