Final week!

Interns

I wasn’t able to meet with Dra. Magaly so I decided to continue my rotations at Hospital Civil.  My first two days were with Labor and Delivery. L&D is an experience no matter where you are, but being in a Spanish-speaking public hospital multiplied that experience a ten-fold. Within the first two hours I was there, I saw five deliveries (that I will not describe for the sake of weak-stomached readers), and by the end of the day also got to return to the OR for a Caesarean section. I’m glad that I waited until the second week to go to L&D because it was the busiest department I visited and it was easy to feel lost and out of place. I did apply my method of asking to do as many things as possible, no matter how trivial (putting a diaper on a newborn), to build a trusting relationship and slowly be allowed to do more (catching the newborn!).

Saw these murals after a quick
hike around my neighborhood.

The next two days I went to internal medicine which was a bit more difficult to find a way to be helpful. I ended up shadowing a resident as much as I could. The nice part is this made me follow the resident when he went to get labs done, consulted with radiology, and so on which is harder to keep track of when you have to stay on the floor. It's a part of the medical process which is important to witness, and it was interesting seeing it from a Mexican perspective.

 For my last day, I went back to my favorite: peds! It was the perfect way to end because I was able to follow up on some patients I had met the previous week. Also, the realization that I still loved peds despite being in such a different environment solidified it as my go-to specialty.

I completed 30 hours of Spanish classes!

It’s crazy how quickly time went by and I got way more out of this experience than I could have possibly imagined. I previously shied away from short missions trips because I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to fully immerse myself in the culture and really get something out of it while giving back. This trip with CFHI was perfect because my role often fell at the same level as it would be in the US which made it easier to feel immersed into the environment. A month was also the perfect amount of time to get to know plenty of people, learn medical knowledge in Spanish, and get to know the area well enough that I would feel comfortable visiting another time (which I can't wait to do). I absolutely recommend it to any other med (or nursing) students!