Hi All,
Well…. other than the heat… and the fact that I am sweating as much or more than I do when I visit Texas in the summer (since most facilities, even most hospital units, are not air conditioned) we are doing great here!! J
The students are rotating to some of the units in the Lady Ridgeway Hospital, a large 1000+ bed pediatric hospital. It is fantastic that they have so many different experiences available here. Mostly they have been in cardiothoracic/SICU; burns/rehab; medical/surgical; out patient department and child guidance clinics; ENT/plastic surgery. They are also rotating through the operating theatre. Some of the students were able to see a couple of neurosurgery cases today. There are many similarities and many, many differences between the health care systems (Sri Lanka and USA). The students are having great experiences but are having to consider some really tough issues such as very limited resources, health care from a different cultural understanding of pain (e.g., not giving any/much pain meds before debriding wounds on severely burned children, especially from different ethnic groups within the country), different perceptions of “standard/universal precautions”, etc., etc.
We went to meet the Minister of Health for Sri Lanka last Friday afternoon. We had several pictures taken. Saturday, we heard that the local radio stations reported about Northwest University nursing students working “interning” within the Lady Ridgeway Hospital. Today, we heard that on Sunday, our pictures were on the TV here; and today, we saw one of our pictures in the local newspaper here. We will purchase some extra copies to show when we return to Seattle. Pretty interesting!
We had several really good lectures this afternoon related to infectious diseases, weaning practices within the culture, statistics related to cardiovascular disorders in children, childhood nutrition, etc.
Janet and Adam, and Jala their “assistant” here, are absolutely delightful to work with. Fantastic ministry within the country! We have also enjoyed going to a church service both Sunday… the members have prayed for us and have been so kind in several ways.
Must go for now… having fun here! J
Thanks!
Melba
Hi All!
