Surgical Society: Shadowing Officer

In just 1 year with the Surgical Society, I took part in most of the opportunities that it offers. In my opinion, the shadowing scheme is fundamental to the entire journey into surgery. This is because students need to experience the thrill of being in the theatre, so that they may plunge themselves into this career full-heartedly.

I want to become the Shadowing Officer to fulfil the crucial role that helps ensure members have a fun and realistic insight into to the world of surgery. This is especially the case for the younger members which require a bit of help to decide on their path and kickstart their surgical journeys. In this role I would focus on the following:

• Transparency – especially when it comes to the allocation process
• Prioritising the pre-clinical students and new members
• Expanding the shadowing scheme to include surgical training programmes which are part of research

The experience of being an academic, welfare and operations and finance RUMS first year rep means that I have become proficient in email communication and liaising with busy people. Additionally, balancing those roles means that I learned how to effectively organise my time and my available resources, preparing me for dealing with the logistics of the officer role.

I have demonstrated my commitment to this society, and now I am determined to use my skills to inspire our members through the best shadowing experiences possible.  

I have been a member of surgical society for three years and have enjoyed events ran by the society where it has provided me with opportunities to look at potential career paths in surgery through great talks and workshops. This year I was a member of the medical society general medicine subcommittee and individually I was able to organise a talk discussing the clinical diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease alongside future therapeutics to give a flavour of what the neuroscience iBSc was all about.

Shadowing enables people to get a first hand look at what they want to enter career wise, and is crucial when considering a career in surgery. As a medical student, I’ve applied for shadowing and understand how hard it is to get those opportunities and surgical society should be a way to make that acquisition of experience easier. 

I will be able to benefit this position by being able to make sure people who request shadowing through the society get a response and if we aren’t able to provide members with an opportunity in a reasonable timeframe, instead of ignoring them, I would email them other ways to get shadowing experience including giving some email addresses of people they can contact directly and what to include in such emails. That way members will be able to benefit from surgical society even more and I hope to be able to get everyone who requests shadowing experience an opportunity to shadow through the surgical society should I be voted to this position.