Cabrera lies to the north of where I was living and is maybe a 20-25 minute commute; Nagua lies to the south, placed a little farther away, taking about 40-45 minutes to arrive. After the cramped journey by truck and guagua, we walked into the public hospital to find ourselves squeezing past lines and crowds of people waiting for consults and registering at the administrative office - a crowd not unusual for a Monday morning.
We waited for nearly two hours in the heat of the hallway, which was open-air to the courtyard outside; the temperature hung around 90 degrees. At long last, the Director of the hospital arrived and, after a short few minutes, motioned for us to come to talk to him. He was surprised to learn we had been in the country for nearly two months and that we had been living in the campo near Cabrera. He was happy to get us set up with shadowing the surgeon (this was on Friday), but we would have to return on Monday morning (today).
Soon, we found ourselves following the director on a small tour of the hospital as we made our way to the surgery department. There, he left us with three nurses who were wrapping and organizing sterilized surgical tools and used surgical tools to be sterilized in the autoclave. We waited for a while, but no sign of any surgeries coming in.
We moved to a tiny break room where we met a general physician, pediatrician, and general surgeon. We chatted with them for a while, as we waited for surgeries, of which none presented. After the doctors left, a nurse sat down with us and gave us some gauze sheets she had us help her fold into pockets; she taught us how to fold them and we quickly had piles of the pockets, ready for surgery, on the tray. We got to talk a lot with her, and she invited us to see her house the next time we would come back.
Although we had made this second trip to Nagua, a fairly long trip from home, no surgeries happened in the morning before we had to leave shortly after noon. However, it was well worth the trip, since we met awesome doctors and nurses and created great relationships for the future.
We waited for nearly two hours in the heat of the hallway, which was open-air to the courtyard outside; the temperature hung around 90 degrees. At long last, the Director of the hospital arrived and, after a short few minutes, motioned for us to come to talk to him. He was surprised to learn we had been in the country for nearly two months and that we had been living in the campo near Cabrera. He was happy to get us set up with shadowing the surgeon (this was on Friday), but we would have to return on Monday morning (today).
Soon, we found ourselves following the director on a small tour of the hospital as we made our way to the surgery department. There, he left us with three nurses who were wrapping and organizing sterilized surgical tools and used surgical tools to be sterilized in the autoclave. We waited for a while, but no sign of any surgeries coming in.
We moved to a tiny break room where we met a general physician, pediatrician, and general surgeon. We chatted with them for a while, as we waited for surgeries, of which none presented. After the doctors left, a nurse sat down with us and gave us some gauze sheets she had us help her fold into pockets; she taught us how to fold them and we quickly had piles of the pockets, ready for surgery, on the tray. We got to talk a lot with her, and she invited us to see her house the next time we would come back.
Although we had made this second trip to Nagua, a fairly long trip from home, no surgeries happened in the morning before we had to leave shortly after noon. However, it was well worth the trip, since we met awesome doctors and nurses and created great relationships for the future.