A Week of Hard but Rewarding Work in Honduras
By Mara Levitt, MD, & Ashley Davis, MD
Honduras, a Central American country bordered by Guatemala, El Salvador, and Nicaragua, is home to more than eight million people, and produces minerals, coffee, tropical fruit and sugar cane. The capital, Tegucigalpa, is divided into 18 departments; we traveled to Intibuca.
Honduras has the highest rate of homicide in the world. The water supply and sanitation varies from modernized water treatment systems to basic systems, from sewer systems to latrines and basic septic pits. A lack of maintenance leads to poor water quality, and residents’ health varies depending on...
Source: Going Global - November 11, 2013 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
A Week of Hard but Rewarding Work in Honduras
By Mara Levitt, MD, & Ashley Davis, MD
Honduras, a Central American country bordered by Guatemala, El Salvador, and Nicaragua, is home to more than eight million people, and produces minerals, coffee, tropical fruit and sugar cane. The capital, Tegucigalpa, is divided into 18 departments; we traveled to Intibuca.
Honduras has the highest rate of homicide in the world. The water supply and sanitation varies from modernized water treatment systems to basic systems, from sewer systems to latrines and basic septic pits. A lack of maintenance leads to poor water quality, and residents’ health varies depending on whe...
Source: Going Global - November 11, 2013 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
Teaching Ultrasound in Guatemala
By Peyton Hassinger, MD
I spent a week working with Mayan Medical Aid in a small Guatemalan village called Santa Cruz this past March. I traveled to the clinic, which was located on Lake Atitlan in the country’s volcanic highlands, with my fiancé who is an emergency medicine nurse at Palmetto Health. We treated patients with a variety of acute and chronic complaints, including prenatal care, and referred patients back to the primary clinic in Santa Cruz when necessary. We also ran outreach clinics to small and remote villages that could be reached only by foot and boat.
One of the greatest parts of...
Source: Going Global - October 11, 2013 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
Teaching Ultrasound in Guatemala
By Peyton Hassinger, MD
I spent a week working with Mayan Medical Aid in a small Guatemalan village called Santa Cruz this past March. I traveled to the clinic, which was located on Lake Atitlan in the country’s volcanic highlands, with my fiancé who is an emergency medicine nurse at Palmetto Health. We treated patients with a variety of acute and chronic complaints, including prenatal care, and referred patients back to the primary clinic in Santa Cruz when necessary. We also ran outreach clinics to small and remote villages that could be reached only by foot and boat.
One of the greatest parts of the tri...
Source: Going Global - October 11, 2013 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
An Amazing Experience in Nepal
By Heather Brown, MD
I had an amazing opportunity to spend a month working in the ED at Scheer Memorial Hospital in Banepa, Nepal, during my second year of residency. Scheer is a missionary hospital 30 kilometers outside Kathmandu with a six-bed emergency room open 24 hours a day. The ED was staffed with a mix of seasoned western physicians and young Nepali house staff who were mostly recent medical school graduates. There were plenty of chances to make a serious impact, and I was ready to do just that!
Arriving in Nepal
I’ve been passionate about international medicine since I was in college, and I cou...
Source: Going Global - September 12, 2013 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
An Amazing Experience in Nepal
By Heather Brown, MD
I had an amazing opportunity to spend a month working in the ED at Scheer Memorial Hospital in Banepa, Nepal, during my second year of residency. Scheer is a missionary hospital 30 kilometers outside Kathmandu with a six-bed emergency room open 24 hours a day. The ED was staffed with a mix of seasoned western physicians and young Nepali house staff who were mostly recent medical school graduates. There were plenty of chances to make a serious impact, and I was ready to do just that!
Arriving in Nepal
I’ve been passionate about international medicine since I was in college, and I couldn’t...
Source: Going Global - September 12, 2013 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
Lessons from Haiti: Don’t Take Hot Showers and Drinkable Water for Granted
By Scott Kurpiel, MD
Practicing medicine in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, was an amazing experience that gave me a tremendous amount of perspective on health care and life. I was fortunate as the trip leader to recruit a well-rounded team of health care professionals, including 10 nurses, six doctors, two EMTs, and one sports rehabilitation therapist. We worked in a gated hospital that was secured by armed guards. The complex contained Haiti’s only full-body CT scanner, which was only available from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Most patients were seen urgently, and were dispositioned from a two- to four-person triage tent.
Arriving a...
Source: Going Global - August 7, 2013 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
Lessons from Haiti: Don’t Take Hot Showers and Drinkable Water for Granted
By Scott Kurpiel, MD
Practicing medicine in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, was an amazing experience that gave me a tremendous amount of perspective on health care and life. I was fortunate as the trip leader to recruit a well-rounded team of health care professionals, including 10 nurses, six doctors, two EMTs, and one sports rehabilitation therapist. We worked in a gated hospital that was secured by armed guards. The complex contained Haiti’s only full-body CT scanner, which was only available from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Most patients were seen urgently, and were dispositioned from a two- to four-person triage tent.
Arriving at th...
Source: Going Global - August 7, 2013 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
A Mission to One of the Most Devastated Places in the World
By Josh Skaggs, MD
I went on a medical mission to East Africa’s South Sudan this past January and February. The country is one of the most undeveloped, isolated, and devastated places in the world, and it was an amazing experience even though being there was incredibly tough.
South Sudan and Sudan used to be under the control of Egypt, and were overseen by Great Britain. Great Britain withdrew from Sudan, its former colony, in 1956. Sudan had two regions at that time, the Arab north and the tribal south. War broke out after the northern Sudanese government began killing all non-Arabs in the south who would not ...
Source: Going Global - July 15, 2013 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
A Mission to One of the Most Devastated Places in the World
By Josh Skaggs, MD
I went on a medical mission to East Africa’s South Sudan this past January and February. The country is one of the most undeveloped, isolated, and devastated places in the world, and it was an amazing experience even though being there was incredibly tough.
South Sudan and Sudan used to be under the control of Egypt, and were overseen by Great Britain. Great Britain withdrew from Sudan, its former colony, in 1956. Sudan had two regions at that time, the Arab north and the tribal south. War broke out after the northern Sudanese government began killing all non-Arabs in the south who would not “c...
Source: Going Global - July 15, 2013 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
Making a Dream a Reality
By Joseph Kim, MD.
As a Korean-American, I have always been curious about exploring my heritage. Fortunately, I have had the opportunity to visit South Korea several times, including two trips during residency. Each time I visited, I realized that I had developed a desire to live in South Korea one day. But deciding to work in Korea as a physician was an enormous decision, and I did not want to make it lightly. I wanted to have the chance to explore the life of an emergency physician in South Korea before making such a life-altering decision.
I began researching potential hospitals that might allow me to rotate...
Source: Going Global - June 11, 2013 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
Making a Dream a Reality
By Joseph Kim, MD.
As a Korean-American, I have always been curious about exploring my heritage. Fortunately, I have had the opportunity to visit South Korea several times, including two trips during residency. Each time I visited, I realized that I had developed a desire to live in South Korea one day. But deciding to work in Korea as a physician was an enormous decision, and I did not want to make it lightly. I wanted to have the chance to explore the life of an emergency physician in South Korea before making such a life-altering decision.
I began researching potential hospitals that might allow me to rotate thr...
Source: Going Global - June 11, 2013 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
A Step Back in Time
By Nathan Ramsey, MD
I traveled to Ghana, West Africa, during the fall of 2010 with the sidHARTe program (www.sidharte.org) sponsored by the Joseph L. Mailman School of Public Health of Columbia University. I spent six weeks at a district hospital participating in an educational program, the goal of which was to develop a curriculum and to focus on training midlevel providers in the basics of emergency medicine. Emergency medicine is a developing specialty in Ghana. Most emergency care is provided in ill-equipped casualty units in district hospitals. The units are rarely staffed by physicians and the first-line provid...
Source: Going Global - May 16, 2013 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
A Step Back in Time
By Nathan Ramsey, MD
I traveled to Ghana, West Africa, during the fall of 2010 with the sidHARTe program (www.sidharte.org) sponsored by the Joseph L. Mailman School of Public Health of Columbia University. I spent six weeks at a district hospital participating in an educational program, the goal of which was to develop a curriculum and to focus on training midlevel providers in the basics of emergency medicine. Emergency medicine is a developing specialty in Ghana. Most emergency care is provided in ill-equipped casualty units in district hospitals. The units are rarely staffed by physicians and the first-line provider...
Source: Going Global - May 16, 2013 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
A Once-in-a-Lifetime Opportunity
Get a real taste of medical care in China in this video of a trip to Chengdu that Chris Moore, MD, and Thomas Cook, MD, took in July 2011. It’s a bit long (39 minutes), but well worth your time to see how the world’s largest hospital cares for residents of what is now China’s third largest city: population 14 million. (New York City’s population, by comparison, is eight million.)
West China Hospital boasts 6,100 staff, more than 4,500 beds, 36 clinical departments, 15 medical technology departments, and more than 100 OR suites that perform 300 surgeries a day. Patients pay for care before they receive it; a he...
Source: Going Global - April 9, 2013 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
