Any time a unit is not being utilized for patient care, do not let it sit idle. After you have spent some time learning the equipment’s instrumentation, use the time to scan. Find volunteers willing to let you place a transducer on them, another student, a sonographer, the cat. Start with scanning something easily accessible, the liver and gallbladder for example. Practice finding anatomy. Then find the same anatomy from a different window. Practice moving the transducer, angling the transducer, turning the transducer, note what happens. Roll the person from side to side, half way up, all the way up. Have them take a deep breath while holding the transducer still, and then fix on a particular piece of anatomy and try to keep it in view while they breathe deeply. Change how much pressure you are placing on the transducer. Push bowel out of the way, release. Change the megahertz, change the focus, adjust the overall gain, and TGC. Change as many things as you can and see what happens. Play with the image. As time goes on, practice on different body parts. Just scan. Put yourself in front of the ultrasound equipment as much as possible. There is no substitute for scanning. It is great if you have someone in the room with you who will guide you a bit, but even if you do not, scan anyway.

There are some institutions out there that have policies that prohibit scanning volunteers, usually because of liability reasons. If you run into this issue, talk to the supervisor or department head to see if you can come up with a solution. Perhaps having volunteers sign a waiver would alleviate the facilities concerns. Maybe you can get personnel at your school involved. Work together.

I believe schools should completely vet out sites before placing any students. Parameters such as the number of exams performed, the number of registered technologists, the amount of radiologist involvement, and policies about student scanning, both real patients, and volunteers, should be well known by the school. Unfortunately, because often the school is struggling to find and keep enough clinical sites for the number of students they have to place, these parameters are often overlooked or ignored. This is your education. If the clinical site is lacking, insist on help from the school in getting it up to par or insist on being placed elsewhere.