Rotary Club of Summit County member Chris John wanted to start a program where students could experience professions in health care, so last year he and other club members reached out to Dr. Kendrick Adnan, an urgent care specialist at Vail Health.

Adnan had not heard of Exploring, a program run by Scouting America that gives middle school- to high school-aged kids the chance to learn about professions through career experiences and mentorship.

“(I) found out this is a great opportunity for me to share my enthusiasm for health care with the high school students,” Adnan said.

Adnan helped start Vail Health Explorers, and after organizers set up a table at a Summit High career fair, Adnan said 25-30 students signed up this year. The program hosts introduction sessions for different medical field specialties, which draw around 15 students, and then students can sign up to shadow specialists in the Vail Health system in smaller groups.

This year, the program held introduction sessions and shadow opportunities for four specialties: urgent care, physical and occupational therapy, orthopedics, and pre-operation and post-anesthesia care in the operating room.

“For example, we started with urgent care,” Adnan said. “We did a Stop the Bleed class with a trauma program through Vail Health, everybody learned how to do Stop the Bleed, and then we dovetailed that with getting students set up with shadowing in the urgent care.”

Summit High School junior Kate Williams and senior Tenley Vinas participated in the Vail Health Explorers program. Williams said she enjoyed seeing what doctors’ jobs look like on an average day in the urgent care when she shadowed. 

Williams enjoyed learning about the Martti translation service, which uses what Adnan described as an iPad on wheels to video chat a translator, in the urgent care.

“It was really cool to see how getting over that language barrier was made possible through using the new technology we have now to talk with patients and help them,” Williams said.

As for Vinas, her favorite experience was in the orthopedic session with Vail-Summit Orthopedics & Neurosurgery. Vindas will attend the University of Alabama in the fall on a pre-medical track and is interested in pursuing orthopedics.

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“Through the health explorers, we did have a simulated orthopedic surgery, putting in plates and screws,” Vinas said. “I really found that that was really interesting to me, and something I can definitely pursue.” 

Vinas said the program provides opportunities that might otherwise be too expensive or time-intensive for many students to pursue, especially if they are not set on studying medicine in college.

“Something like this was amazing for us to have (in) Summit County,” Vinas said. “(It) allowed students to, one, not only (not) have to travel far distances or jump through hundreds of hoops, but it really is easily accessible and has really allowed for students to pursue an option or even just explore one thing before committing to it and possibly putting some financial strain.”

Williams is interested in a medical career and said the program has given her the chance to see different career paths. She said she is not set on a specialty yet and plans to participate in the program and learn about more specialties next year.

Kristin Natale, the nurse and medical terminology teacher at Summit High, said students brought “professionalism and enthusiasm” to the program and came back to her classes with incredible stories to tell.

“We have a class here at the high school, the intro class to all of these health science classes is Health Science 1,” Natale said. “This program really just brings that class to life.”

The program also exposes students to hospital environments early in their education, something Natale said helps students who take classes at Summit to become certified nurse’s aides their senior year. Natale said they learn everything needed to take their CNA test.

“Usually, in the past, it would be their first day stepping into a hospital setting, doing their clinicals,” Natale said. “Having this under their belt is going to be just a whole (other) ball game for their confidence level.”

Natale added that the program’s offerings, including observing surgeries and doing a suture clinic, impressed her.

“Things that I’ve never done in 18 years as a nurse, they’ve experienced in this program,” Natale said.

The Stop the Bleed class, Vinas said, felt “useful in present day” because if someone was bleeding out, the students that attended would know what to do.

“You don’t have to wait until you’re like, past (medical) school or anything to do that,” Vinas said. “I feel like the hands-on (experience) allowed students to really see themselves possibly doing this as a career.”

The Vail Health Explorers program gave Vinas some advantages as she heads to college, she said. It has helped her be more sure of what career she wants to pursue and given her the chance to talk to doctors about how best to approach medical education. She said she learned more about studying for the MCAT from doctors in the program.

“Little things like that have definitely helped me and the other seniors really establish a good path for college,” Vinas said.

Williams said the program will have some repeat specialties in its informational sessions and shadow opportunities next year, but it will also add new ones. She said she looks forward to learning about the new ones and taking the CNA class, especially with the knowledge she already has from the health explorers program.

Any students interested in joining the program next year can find more information and sign up at the next career fair, Adnan said. Students can also reach out to him at ken.adnan@vailhealth.org or Meghan Ahearn-Steven, a physician assistant at Vail Health that helps with the program, at meghan.ahearn@vailhealth.org.

Any student interested in a career in medicine, even if they are not sure about it, should try joining the health explorers, Williams said.

“I highly recommend you come to the program,” Williams said. “It gives you a whole variety of different programs to try from all different — ranging all different types of jobs and careers within it.”