Practicum experiences

When I started my health psychology practicum, my supervisor and I focused on my main passion (management of chronic illness/disability). I wrote to a few health institutions in this area, saying that I was a Massey University student seeking a voluntary placement. The Laura Fergusson Brain Injury Trust (LFT) responded positively, and my job supervisor provided a varied and enjoyable placement experience.

LFT is a non-profit organisation that provides a multi-disciplinary approach to treating concussions and traumatic brain injuries. Services are provided by occupational therapists and speech-language pathologists.

With customers in diverse locations (LFT offices, homes, or communities), I was able to see several health professionals at work. It taught me a lot about how the biomedical approach works in New Zealand's health care systems. Observing the numerous interactions helped me to think about the biomedical model's workings and limits, and how this impacts our practice as health professionals.

As part of my placement project, I made a video. LFT had no relevant projects in which I could join, so I made a video. Instead, my boss and I discussed developing an intervention-based tool. We agreed that I would gather possible mHealth concepts to offer to the clinical psychology team at LFBIT. The end product was a video resource for TBI informal carers in New Zealand. It explores the reality and experiences of being a caregiver and gives access to more information.

After my placement, one of the psychologists recommended me for a position, and LFT hired me as a rehabilitation coach. This has allowed for more critical evaluation on working inside New Zealand's health care systems as a rehab coach.

My health psychology practicum influenced the questions I ask on the job. These include defining health and sickness, determining who is responsible for our health outcomes (individual or collective society), and determining how my personal life positioning affects interactions with clients and other healthcare professionals.

I completed my practicum placement with Women’s Health Action (WHA), a women’s health promotion NGO that considers the social determinants of health. After my practicum, I continued working at WHA1 part-time and was offered a full-time role upon completion of my Masters, leading a health information service for women and coordinating health promotion events. 

Thereafter, I took up a placement in Kiribati with Volunteer Services Abroad to work with the Kiribati Family Health Association and Ministry of Health as a cervical screening systems adviser. I spent 9 months living and working in Kiribati developing new systems for cervical screening to improve recall and referral processes and promote participation in cervical screening. 

After my time in Kiribati, I worked at Family Planning NZ as a Health promoter. This role involved delivering health promotion activities to diverse audiences around sexual health, sexuality and healthy relationships. This includes direct education to groups of young people and adults, as well as professional development and support to those working to support priority groups, and contributing to national projects within the organisation.Key priorities include working to reduce health inequalities and improve sexual and reproductive health through a holistic approach, and to ensure practice is culturally responsive and improves health outcomes for Maori. 

Most recently, I have taken up a position as senior project coordinator at Le Va Pasifika, which involves the promotion, coordination and delivery of LifeKeepers, a national suicide prevention training and education programme.

Studying at Massey was an amazing experience for me as I learnt to look at health not just as something which people work towards attaining, but as something that cannot be separated from social context. I learnt that you cannot look at health without thinking about inequality, sexism, racism, poverty, power and politics. 

My practicum at took place at a Gisborne rest home in semester two 2014. At the time I was working as a physiotherapy aide and my supervisor advised that I could incorporate the practicum into my current working role.

I approached the physiotherapist and my clinical nurse manager and we put together a project that was to help cater to the psychological needs of residents through a physical medium; physiotherapy treatment and assisted exercises, which would also provide a medium for me to build a rapport with residents and take the time to talk to them about their health and wellbeing needs, topics which matter to them and provide encouragement and support to help alleviate the negative affects of pain and physical injury.

What I remember occurring for me over those 8 weeks was a first hand introduction into the medical world where the biomedical model sat at the top of the organisational hierarchy. A biomedical model would have never provided a best fit for the project and during discussions with the clinical nurse manager and physiotherapist it was highlighted that the ideals that lie behind the biopsychosocial model was a goal within the facility, although consistently competing with the rules and regulations installed by the biomedical model. This became interesting to me as being a health psychology student coming face to face with the biomedical model, I had to learn to adjust and be flexible with what would fit the rest home environment, the needs of the residents and the capabilities of the staff.

I found one of the best parts of this practicum was having the opportunity to create a practicum project, I feel it heightened and extended my learning opportunities within the practicum, and I would encourage others to do the same if possible. It also enabled me to develop and become involved in an area of health psychology that I have become increasingly passionate and curious about, that being death and dying, end-of-life care, elder health and ageing.

During my 6 week practicum experience at Arthritis New Zealand I observed and participated in a variety of different types of service delivery activities alongside Arthritis Educators. These activities were based on a socio-cognitive approach to intervention with the aim of improving the lives of people suffering from arthritis, particularly osteoarthritis, gout and inflammatory types of arthritis. The various activities and interactions with both clients and staff provided many and varied opportunities to gain insight, learn, develop skills and see the realities of applied community health theory.

My overall focus during my experience was on gout, which is the second most common type of arthritis in New Zealand. Educators improve the lives of people affected by gout by providing health education information relevant to the cause, treatment and management of gout. This is delivered across many different modalities and in many different community settings, including individual one-on-one clinics in person or on the telephone, small group clinics, large cultural events such as festivals, seminars that include guest speakers from other disciplines, and a community development approach via volunteer training.

I couldn’t recommend participating in a practicum more highly. I found this practicum to be an invaluable experience. It gave me practical experience at observing cultural competency in a real situation as well as developing my own cultural competency, challenged me to examine previously held assumptions that I was not aware I was making, and allowed me to understand the practical and collaborative aspects of working within an NGO not-for-profit setting. It helped me to establish contacts in the health promotion world, and put worthwhile and relevant experience on my CV. Perhaps most importantly, the experience gave me a sense of competence and confidence by allowing me to apply theoretical learning and "booksmarts" to a practical, real-world experience.

My practicum was with Arthritis New Zealand, a national voluntary organisation dedicated to working towards improved management of arthritis and wellbeing. I worked alongside Zoe McGavock, an Arthritis Educator, who is a graduate of the Health Psychology Masters programme at Massey University. I was able to experience the role of an Arthritis Educator, one of the most active services in the community, providing support and education about arthritis.

During my years of study, I have developed a passion for elderly health and wanted to do a practicum with an organisation that would allow me to work with this age group. Not only did my practicum with Arthritis New Zealand fulfill my wish to work with elderly, but also exposed me to the experiences of youth with arthritis, which I found inspiring. I gained valuable experience working with different cultural groups in their communities, which highlighted the importance of interacting at a local level and how critical cultural competency is in practice. I relished the opportunity to apply theory I had learnt to a real-world setting, which cemented the importance and relevance of the concepts taught in the course to working as a health psychologist.

My advice to those thinking about doing the practicum is, first of all, do one! Secondly, I would recommend looking for an organisation that provides a service in your field of interest, so you can develop skills that will be valuable for your future career. My practicum gave me essential real-life working skills and experiences that I can take into my future career as a health psychologist.

I can’t thank Zoe and Arthritis New Zealand enough for taking me on and making me feel welcome and a part of the organisation. On finishing my hours with Arthritis New Zealand, I was very reluctant to leave as I enjoyed my time there, and the people I met, so much. I give the practicum experience my greatest endorsement and recommend it to everyone who is studying health psychology.

I completed my practicum at the Auckland Regional Public Health Services (ARPHS). ARPHS offered me the opportunity to critically observe and reflect on programmes and health issues that affect our very own Auckland region.

ARPHS regulates public health by protecting and promoting the health and wellbeing of the overall community by preventing risks around health issues. Being New Zealand’s largest public health organisation, ARPHS specialises in various aspects of health promotion, including alcohol and tobacco, workplace health, environmental health, nutrition and healthy eating, to name a few. Given the large nature of the organisation, ARPHS conducts numerous projects throughout the year. I felt very fortunate to be part of two of these projects, where I worked with the alcohol, and early childhood education health promotion teams.

I chose to work with ARPHS to further explore my interest in the health promotion arena. Health policies move beyond regulating individuals’ behaviour, accounting for social and environmental interventions. During my six weeks at ARPHS, I was able to work around health policies, build professional relationships and apply theory professionally within the organisation to address health issues in our community. I was given the opportunity to develop my research and communication skills, namely written and oral presentation skills.

The choice of your practicum can help you not only apply theory from your health psychology endorsement into practice during your practicum, but also expand your knowledge about the various ways of communicating health to our community. It is  important to remember that whether it is a goal around commencing your thesis, developing research, or registering as a psychologist, the practicum experience will be an exciting time for you to think about your career goals!

In November 2012 I was granted a summer scholarship from the Waikato Clinical School of Auckland University to facilitate focus groups as part of an evaluation of Bodywise. I was very fortunate in this opportunity as it also afforded me an ideal environment for my practicum. Bodywise is a family-focussed weight management programme for children aged 5 to 12 who have a Body Mass Index (BMI) in the obese range, run by the Waikato District Health Board in collaboration with Sport Waikato.

I worked with the bodywise team which comprised a consultant clinical psychologist, a medical doctor, a dietitian and an activity co-ordinator. My role was to arrange and facilitate the focus groups, to transcribe the discussions, complete the analysis, and to write up the report. I was also responsible for conducting a literature review, and for presenting the findings to the bodywise team.

Prior to my practicum, I had no experience in conducting focus groups, but I received excellent support and advice from both Natalie Parkes, my field supervisor and principal researcher for this project, and Dr Antonia Lyons, my academic supervisor. The findings have informed changes to the programme. I presented the results at the Waikato Clinical School Biannual Research Seminar (as part of the summer scholarship).

While my practicum was unusual in that it was part of a funded summer studentship, it was an excellent opportunity to work with a range of people. There were times I needed to clarify which hat I was wearing, as I juggled roles between researcher, employee and student, but I gained valuable learning in each role. I am profoundly grateful to both Natalie and Antonia for their superb supervision, tact and patience. The practicum might seem daunting, but the hands-on experience is invaluable and in my opinion, is a major strength of Massey’s health psychology programme.

My practicum experience took place at Outreach Therapy Pets (OTP), a community service programme that is jointly delivered by St John and SPCA Auckland. The OTP programme involves volunteers, and their pets visiting rest homes, hospitals and other health services. OTP offers both animal-assisted activity, and animal-assisted therapy.

I chose to work with OTP as I have a passionate interest in animal-assisted therapy, which I think is important when deciding where you may like to be placed.

I believe that skills that I developed from this practicum placement could not have been learnt by reading alone. I learnt about being a professional in the workplace, and how theories come to life by applying them to real-life situations. You will be placed for 120 hours, and over these hours you get the chance to develop relationships with professionals in areas that you will be interested in and learn how to apply theories that you have learnt through other health psychology papers to real-life situations.

My different activities during my time at OTP included:

• Organising volunteers into groups with a team manager

• Attending animal assisted therapy visits

• Attending the volunteer training day

• Designing and implementing a feedback form for the volunteers on training day

• Working in the office environment

My best advice is to network and get to know the people you are working with, because the experiences they have may help you in your career or thesis. My practicum provided me with contacts in different areas of health, and without this experience I might not have been exposed to such knowledgeable individuals.

Overall, this was as an insightful experience where I was able to integrate my knowledge from the health endorsement programme to workplace life. Plan ahead and enjoy it!

The placement that I completed was at MidCentral District Health Board - Public Health, under the supervision of Sharon Vera, the Professional Advisor/Coordinator for the Health Promotion team. I chose this placement because my health psychology master’s thesis was on teenage binge drinking in Palmerston North, an issue that the Health Promotion team is focused on understanding and changing behaviours through research, interventions and advocacy. I also wanted to gain some practical experience in this field.

I developed a successful collaboration with the health promotion team with regards to my thesis project. While they assisted me with many components, such as ethics application forms, participant recruitment in high schools and carrying out peer-group interviews for my thesis, I assisted them with project development, carrying out research, and providing them with feedback and results from my thesis to assist the development of future projects on teenage binge drinking and alcohol use in Palmerston North.

This was an awesome and challenging practicum that gave me a good insight into health promotion work. Most importantly, I gained an understanding of how theory is implicated in practice, the importance of developing strong relationships and networks within the community, and how to develop, lead, implicate and evaluate projects. I am glad I had the opportunity to participate in a practicum and gain valuable practical experience.