Professionalism is an adherence to a set of values comprising both a formally agreed-upon code of conduct and the informal expectations of colleagues, clients and society. The key values include acting in a patient’s interest, responsiveness to the health needs of society, maintaining the highest standards of excellence in the practice of medicine and in the generation and dissemination of knowledge.
In addition to medical knowledge and skills, medical professionals should present psychosocial and humanistic qualities such as caring, empathy, humility and compassion, as well as social responsibility and sensitivity to people’s culture and beliefs. All these qualities are expected of members of highly trained professions. There are many attributes that contribute to being professional. The many that stick out in my mind are responsibility and accountability, leadership, honor and integrity, respect, and caring compassion and communication.
All of these attributes pertain to the professional work environment in the own important way. When you are a professional you need to have responsibility and accountability. This means you have to demonstrate awareness of your own limitations, and identify developmental needs and approaches for improvements. You care for yourself appropriately and you present yourself in an appropriate manner (demeanor, dress, and hygiene). You recognize and report errors and poor behavior in peers. You have to take responsibility for appropriate share of teamwork. You have to arrive to work on time.
You need to be accountable for deadlines, complete assignments and responsibilities on time. To be a person who is deemed professional you have to have a sense of leadership. Leadership in the healthcare field means you have to be willing to teach others. You help build and maintain a culture that facilitates professionalism. As a leader you do not participate in workplace pranks. Another important aspect of professionalism is honor and integrity. To have honor and integrity in the workplace you need to be forthcoming with information; and not hold important information for your own benefit.
You can admit your own errors. You deal with confidential information discreetly and appropriately. One of the most important attributes regarding professionalism is respect. You have to respect institutional staff and all staff representatives. You have to respect patients rights and dignity and their privacy and confidentiality. A person who is professional has to have caring, compassionate and have communication. You treat the patient as an individual taking into account lifestyle, religious beliefs, and ethnicity. You communicate bad news with sincerity and compassion.
You deal with sickness, death, and dying in a professional manner with the patient and the patient’s family members. Being a radiation therapist means you are a part of a multi disciplinary approach to curing cancer. Being part of a multi disciplinary approach means you have to have the professional aspect of teamwork. Teamwork is an intracle part of every oncology department. Nothing would be accomplished in an oncology department if teamwork was not evident. If you are a person that lacks teamwork then you lack one of the most important skills of professionalism that a radiation therapists has.
Since therapist interact with the patient on a daily basis developing a close relationship with the oncology patient. The demands of these duties require an emotionally mature person, who has the caring, communication and compassion. All of these attributes are used on a daily basis while being a student. The most important of these attributes learned will be teamwork and respect. Being a radiation therapy student it is sometimes hard to remember that reaching a common goal requires the work of the whole oncology team. Respect is something that is gained by the people in your department.
It is gained by improving with everything you do, your daily interaction with staff, and your overall attitude towards your education. As a student I haven’t observed to many behaviors that would contribute to unprofessionalism. But one I remember the most was patient confidentiality. When I started one of my rotations there was construction being done. I observed patient’s charts sitting around when the construction workers were walking by the control console. This is the only time that I ever viewed unprofessionalism as a student.
