Jacksonville Orthopedic Institute

So life has been a crazy last week and this one with tests and practicals and all that goes along with that.  And all of that means that I haven't gotten a chance to tell everyone about my shadowing experience last week at Jacksonville Orthopedic Institute, or JOI.  As some of you may know, I've gotten a little discouraged with some of my shadowing experiences because a lot of the people I saw were just too sick for me to see any improvement with therapy during a one day experience.  Well JOI restored my faith!  I spent the day mostly with a certified hand therapist which was actually very interesting.  I think sometimes we forget how integral out hands our and how detrimental it can be to your functioning if they are impaired.  I also got to learn how to make a split.  Not like the boring popsicle kind! ;) I actually melted a sheet of thermoplastic and molded it around the therapists hand and thumb and then attached velcro strips to it and made a splint! If my camera worked I would take a picture of the one I actually made but since its dead as a doornail here's the idea:

 Yep, I made one of those...only it was blue! :) Anyway, the other thing that made this a good day was being in an orthopedic based outpatient clinic that was also very sports med oriented.  Both the patients and the therapists throughout the place were up, active and working hard to get better.