Hospital Civil

Last Thursday, I spoke to Dra. Magaly about what I would be doing once I switch to the Hospital. She was wonderful about asking me what my interests were (mostly Peds and maybe Surgery, at this point). So she said I could spend my first half of the week in Surgery and the other half in Peds . At the hospital, my go-to was Dra. Mayda Cruz with whom I set up a schedule of 2 days in Surgery, 2 days in Peds, and 1 day in ED. I was excited and prepared for a hectic week.

I had to report at the hospital at 7am but luckily, it was only 10mn away by bus and this bus stopped right across the street from my house. As soon as I arrived, I could tell the patient volume had tripled from my experience at the Centro de Salud. I never got the time to, but I wanted to count the amount of people waiting outside. My guess: >100.

In the hospital, like the ones in the US, there are multiple levels of medical staff: medical students, nursing students, PT students, interns (although in Mexico they are not considered doctors yet), fellows, and so on. Everyone who is still a student wears all white. And, although I forgot to ask, it appears everyone buys their own white coat so there’s not much consistency in length either. What am I getting at? It’s quite difficult to tell who’s who so unless you manage to get close enough to read name tags, it’s hard to tell who you’re interacting with. The only reason this was a problem  is that as a new student who doesn’t speak/understand Spanish fluently, it’s hard to know who to follow and ask for help, especially when everyone is running around frantically.

My days at surgery went fairly smoothly as I had already done a surgery rotation at my home school. I observed an open appendectomy, a knee surgery, and a brain tumor extraction. Even though I didn’t get to scrub in (because of the high amount of residents that participate in each surgery), the surgeons were always receptive to my questions and helping me learn.

Dr. Jacobo

Next, I did two days with pediatrics. I worked with Dr. Jacobo who ended up being my favorite preceptor my whole trip. He was one of the few who allowed me to be more involved in the patients’ care and pimping me the same way that preceptors would in the US. He also brought me along to a couple presentations by residents. I was pleasantly surprised by how much I could follow along!

My last day of the first week, I spent in the Urgencias (ED). As EDs tend to be, it was crazy busy. There are patients and doctors everywhere and if you blinked, you could miss everything. I tried my best to be useful, and was able to keep practicing procedures I had previously learned at school such as inserting Foley catheters.

The hospital was in general busier than the clinic and if I didn’t try to participate I could easily have ended up standing in a corner all day unnoticed. This helped me learn to be more assertive as a medical student, not just in Oaxaca but back in the US as well (where I would be getting graded for it!).  Something I appreciated, both in the hospital and clinic, was the relaxed culture. No matter where in the hospital I was, everyone dropped everything at 11am for breakfast. This was a great time to talk to the physicians and students to get to know them and the healthcare system better.