Livin It Large In Ecuador: My First Timmy Global Health Brigade

Upon arriving back from Colombia, I had one week in Quito before heading off again, this time to Santo Domingo to help out with a medical brigade as a translator. The brigade was part of Timmy Global Health (http://www.timmyglobalhealth.org), a foundation that brings doctors and nurses from the states to provide medical care to various communities in Ecuador, Guatemala, and the Dominican Republic. I left early Sunday morning to meet up with rest of the group. There were 4 doctors (2 ER doctors, a cardiologist, and a pediatrician), 1 pharmacist, 3 RNs, and about 15 nursing students from Manchester Community College, along with 3 other translators.

After a 3 hour bus ride, we arrived at an old BEAUTIFUL convent, which would serve as our housing for the week. After getting settled, we headed to our first clinic site to get a community tour. It was pretty shocking, as most people were basically living in shacks. After the community tour, we returned to the convent to sort out medicine and prepare for the start of clinic.

We held a clinic Monday thru Friday, each day serving a new community. Clinics were held in various locations: a local health center, community centers, and on the last day, huts outside in an indigenous community. In the clinics, I worked as a translator. For the first days, I worked in the history station. I translated for a nursing student as we questioned patients about past medical issues and current problems. On the fourth day of clinic, I got the confidence to translate with a doctor and, to my surprise, was fine! I loved being in the consult room, as I was able to see how the doctors were treating all the problems that I had heard the patients complaining of in the history station. And I even learned a few things myself (I can tell you the albendazole dose needed for any patient to treat parasites)!

Overall, it was an amazing week. I can't wait to return to the communities in 5 weeks, but this time, with my parents as doctors!