El Plan was located roughly 2 hours from our compound. It was up a steep hill with tiny dirt roads so our bus wasn’t able to make it all the way there. This meant that we had to park the bus at the bottom of the hill and walk to the top to reach the village. Our clinic was set up at their local El Salud, which means health clinic.
The line at El Plan village
After rotating in the other stations, today was my day to rotate into dental. I was happily surprised with how much fun I had! Let me tell ya’ll something, Dental brigading is definitely HARDCORE. Two of our Western U students, Esther and Crystal, were in there kicking total butt on everything. They were assisting with fillings and teeth extractions, even doing some on their own with the dentist’s guidance. I worked mostly with Esther and she is a freakin’ rock star when it comes to extractions. I can’t believe how much she’s learned from brigading on this trip. I wasn’t sure if I was going to be much help since they seemed to have the pattern down and I’m not a dental student. But everyone was great at teaching me what I needed to do to help out. Soon enough, I was there helping out with extractions and I even helped one of the dentists do a suture on the gums! That totally blew me away because I wasn’t expecting to do much but hand tools over to those who knew what they were doing.
Hardcore dental extraction
The dental station also is the most tiring because this station is always the last to finish. You really need to be focused because you’re dealing with sharp tools and a lot of blood. Just so you know, medical brigades and dental brigades involve risk. You’re dealing with infectious diseases, blood, sharp instruments, and a constant stress of wanting to see everyone in the most time-efficient way. Two of my classmates on the trip are currently battling some sort of illness. And many of us are dehydrated due to the heat and clinic conditions.
July 6th, 2010
El Plan Brigade day 2
She was very shy
Today I went back to Triage. It was even hotter today than yesterday so I’m glad Triage was set up outside of the clinic in the shade. It was a half day today because we were able to see everyone fairly quickly. Usually the second day of a brigade is smaller in number than the first. Second day brigading is usually a men’s clinic; although, it’s still open to women and children. Due to my lack of Spanish, I needed to have a translator nearby but lucky for me my translator was Shital, the CEO and founder of global brigades! She is phenomenal and only 29 years old! During the breaks between patients, I was able to talk to her about how global brigades started.
Global Medical Brigades began in 2003 with only a few undergraduate students, one of them being Shital. From there and throughout her studies in graduate school, they continued their trips to countries that needed medical help and recruited friends and colleagues to join them. Within 7 years the brigades expanded and they added dental brigades, public health brigades, and water brigades. The increasing size of the program led Shital to leave her profession as an orthopedist, in order to take over the program as the CEO full time. She now splits her time between Chicago, Honduras, and Panama. Shital will be with us for one more day for our next brigade. I can’t wait to talk to her some more! I wonder if they have a brigade that goes to Asia…
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