Two Jobs Every Healthcare Worker Holds

Teaching keeps care sharp, teams steady and the profession young

Photo by Vitaly Gariev on Unsplash

Clinics shift, rounds stack up and schedules pull in every direction. Yet many healthcare professionals insist on one constant: the call to teach.

Whether in a lecture hall, an operating room or a quick moment between patients, guiding the next generation shapes judgment, protects patients and keeps the work itself alive. Doctors Stephanie Miaco, Helen Madamba and Iris Thiele Isip Tan say it also renews the people who teach.

“I thought of healthcare workers as teachers and lifelong learners because the second semester starts next week,” said Miaco, a psychiatrist who teaches psychology. “I’m sharpening my resolve yet again.”

Keep Learning Alive in Healthcare

Each doctor has had memorable teaching moments as a healthcare worker.

“In psych classes, I always like to wander around the classroom, asking questions,” Miaco said. “It amuses me that students pay more attention with proximity and getting actively asked during lectures. They respond less to a straight lecture, but would rather hear about cases.

“It’s a rarity to have someone aspire to go into the field of mental health,” she said. “So in lectures, it sometimes feels like running an ‘ad’ for a specialty that attracts few. Getting them interested, hopefully, gets people to consider the specialty.”

Yet, students will be students no matter the subject.

“I really get curious about how students think,” Miaco said. “They’re a different generation and have varied interests and ways of doing things.

“They like to sit up and listen to things, especially relatable ones,” she said. “Otherwise, they are preoccupied with studying for the next scheduled exam, which mostly happens after the psych lectures.”

How Doctors Think on the Floor

From a patient’s perspective, a good lesson is that diagnoses are not infallible. Symptoms can arise from different sources. That’s why tests and second opinions are good options, not rejections of a particular provider’s opinion.

“Going on rounds with students, residents and fellows makes me remember when I was in their place,” Tan said. “They tell me I ask a lot of why questions. That’s because I want to understand how they think.”

That is to be expected of Tan, a professor at the University of the Philippines College of Medicine, consultant at the Philippine General Hospital Section of Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism, and visiting consultant at Manila Doctors Hospital.

Self-Discovery Strengthens Healthcare

Madamba, an OB-GYN and infectious disease specialist, recalled her days as a clerk at the University of Santo Tomas, including her experience with ambu bagging — using a bag-valve-mask to manually provide positive pressure ventilation to patients unable to breathe effectively on their own.

“We admitted a cyanotic old man who had a heart attack,” Madamba said. “I had to do ambu bagging the whole night and coach him to breathe with the bag. That taught me that the old man’s life was literally in my hands: I stop bagging, he stops breathing.”

On the academic front, she has also seen “students practically sleep in lectures. They are made more for action.”

Teaching Moments in the OR

Madamba compensates with impromptu classes in the operating room.

“When I do surgeries, once the specimen — or baby — is out, I relax and start asking questions about the case like a final exam,” she said. “We start with the youngest, usually the clerk. If he can’t answer, we move on to the intern. If he can’t answer, we pass to the younger resident.”

Those are just some of the challenges they encounter often as teachers in their field. They also deal with student demographics, teaching sites and scheduling.

Doctors’ Habits Shape Patient Care

“My current teaching schedule is one hour three times a week for a few weeks,” Miaco said. “That needs to be managed well logistically. The school is a bit of a distance and at an hour where traffic in the city is pretty congested.

“Making instructional materials also requires careful thought and preparation, which is an added load to the work of a clinician,” she said. “However, if we want to really prepare medical students for their exposure to the specialty and to encourage more applicants, we need to hustle.”

“One of the highlights of teaching is giving students moments of emotional involvement, which equals better learning,” she said.

What Teaching Gives Back

Lighting a spark among disinterested students works both ways for instructors.

“I experienced a sense of stagnation and dullness in the semesters that I wasn’t teaching,” Miaco said. “Sure, I had more time — or the semblance of it — but it felt unfulfilling. I am excited to teach again.”

From what Tan has seen, students appreciate the effort.

“I really wait for that light bulb moment when you can see comprehension dawn on their faces,” she said. “That’s so worth it.”

Sleepless in Scrubs: Fatigue Puts Patients at Risk

As Tan has taken on more responsibilities, she has found it harder to juggle schedules, but still tries to make rounds twice a week as a ward consultant.

“When classes conflict with meetings and patient emergencies, it’s a problem,” Madamba said. “I’m glad technology provides solutions for this like asynchronous sessions, video lectures and assignments on learning management systems.

“‘Making good exams is also a challenge,’ she said. ‘Training on test construction never grows old for a teacher. We have to make sure the questions reflect what we have taught and what the students should have learned.’”

Where Healthcare Stays Strong

All of the doctors agree that teaching is essential to their careers as healthcare workers.

Teaching sits at the core of good care. It sharpens judgment, builds team confidence and helps patients understand what’s next. Healthcare grows stronger when people pass on experience so others can act with clarity and skill.

“A mentor emphasized that we shouldn’t be doing just plain work in the clinics with patients all the time,” Miaco said. “She taught that it was essential that we also taught students. It keeps us young and helps us recalibrate ourselves. It keeps us fresh.”

Redesign Life From Burnout to Balance

In the end, the healthcare worker stands in two roles at once: healer and guide. Clinics, wards and classrooms shift by the hour, but the duty to pass on insight never loses its weight. Lessons move in both directions — toward students who need a steady voice and back toward mentors who draw energy from new minds and new questions.

As Miaco noted, fulfillment often rises from the moments when healthcare workers share their experience with those who will someday teach in return. That exchange — reciprocal, humbling and constant — keeps the profession young, sharp and rooted in purpose.

Teaching does more than reinforce skills. It protects patients, strengthens teams and shapes the future of care. In a field that refuses to stand still, the only path forward is through people who choose to learn and to lead.

That is where healthcare stays strong: in the hands of those who give knowledge away and stay open to what comes back.