The Student Health Assistants program is a highly structured, student-driven, year-long experiential learning and research program for CSB and SJU pre-professional health students at the Emergency Department of St. Cloud Hospital. Since its establishment seven years ago, SHA has continued to grow and has become a unique and great opportunity to get first hand experience in the medical field.

As a SHA, students will spend a minimum of 12 hours per month completing a variety of tasks, including assisting with community-based research and other clinical duties. Our students work side-by-side with ED professionals to identify a research project, develop a proposal, submit to the Hospital’s IRB committee, and run the data collection and analysis, eventually leading to dissemination.

Through SHA, our students gain valuable experience learning from and supporting physicians, nurses, and other staff through several ways:

• Shadowing
• Helping with transfer of patients
• Assisting nurses with log rolls and other hands-on patient care
• Providing support for department operations, such as turning over rooms.