A Day in the Life
of a Resident

Hi, I’m Katie Stapleton, a Pediatric resident at the University of Illinois College of Medicine Peoria.

I’m excited to show you a typical day on inpatient medicine at OSF Children’s Hospital of Illinois.

6:00 a.m.

I’m finishing my morning run to invigorate my day!

6:45 a.m.

Grabbing my coffee from the Children’s Hospital Cafeteria Kiosk on my way to the floors. The ease of having totally free food and beverages at the hospital, without worrying about call credits, makes meeting my basic necessities more carefree. I consider my morning coffee a necessity.

7:00 a.m.

Morning sign-out. I hear about my new patients admitted by the night team and any overnight events of my continuity patients using my handy IPASS sign-out feature integrated in our EPIC electronic medical record. I like the print feature so that I can take brief notes and use this while I do pre-rounds on my patients.

7:00 a.m. – 9:00 a.m.

Using EPIC, I collect my medical data for each patient with ease and then I am off to bedside to discuss overnight events with nurses, examine my patients, talk with families, and answer any questions they might have this morning. I create my plans for the day and huddle with my senior resident, co-intern, and medical students as my last prep for rounds. My senior resident and Pediatric Hospitalist attend IDRs (Interdisciplinary Rounds) where they quickly huddle with charge nurses, care coordinators, dietitians, child-life, and other supportive services to make sure the needs of my patients will be met from a holistic approach.

9:00 a.m. – 11 a.m.

Time for Family-Centered Rounds with my team! I love how engaged our families are in our discussions and how comfortable I am leading the conversation with the support of my senior resident and attending. It’s great that our multidisciplinary model of rounds includes the nurses and available subspecialists to keep everyone on the same page. Families are the focus of our on-the-fly teaching pearls in the room. We frequently do teaching between rooms too for quick patient-focus learning so that I am learning in the context of providing care to my patients.

11:00 a.m. – 11:45 a.m.

After rounds we wrap up any discharges, orders, and consults that we didn’t get a chance to call during our working rounds. I also take some time to work on my notes. Then it’s time to grab my lunch and head to our daily conferences.

11:45 a.m. – 1 p.m.

I like to enjoy my lunch while participating in our daily morning report (11:45-12:15 pm) and noon conference sessions (12:15-1pm). We have such a wide range of general pediatrics and subspecialty topics that no matter the day I am always excited to engage in a rich discussion. Our hybrid didactic model with in-person speakers and remote broadcasting through Zoom gives me the opportunity to attend in person or remotely. With this technology we are still able to have our GME wide series with all resident and fellows like: MM&I, multidisciplinary rounds, patient safety and quality improvement series, healthcare disparities series, and much more.

1 p.m. – 5:30 p.m.

Time to put any finishing touches on my notes and follow-up with my patients, their pending tests, and consultant recommendations. My team is always accessible to me to help with patient reassessments, family discussions, or adjustment of management plans if needed. Between new admission staffings the various floor teams use this time for short teaching sessions relevant to our current patients. I love our “Hot Inpatient Topics” (HITS) on Tuesday afternoons that focus on core topics for inpatient settings. These are always an added bonus to the week!

5:30 p.m.

Time for sign-out to the night team. Our designated meeting room is quiet and free of disruptions so that we can focus on providing anticipatory guidance to the overnight team for seamless patient care. Our in-house Pediatric Hospitalist is always there to help with any questions or clarification we might have.