Volunteer Days 2, 3, & 4: Multi-day Clinic in Ensenada
The Floating Doctors dedicates its efforts to educate and provide
care to the Panamanians throughout the Panamanian and Caribbean seas. Physicians, nurses, medics, students, and Spanish
translators come from all corners of the world to contribute. In the past three days, I have had the chance
to observe and learn from kind, intelligent physicians who dedicated their time
and efforts to help people who need it the most.
Volunteers move like a machine in the first few hours of our
Multi-day clinics: we all are tasked with unloading equipment and setting up
our administration desk, triage area, provider stations, pharmacy, and a
private room for examinations. Within
about 20 minutes, we have a fully functioning medical clinic where we see a
range of complaints from well-child checks to pre-natal ultrasounds to wound
care. Each patient comes to triage, gets
a vital check with a basic workup of blood sugar checks or the occasional urinalysis,
then sees a provider and translator who treats them as they see fit. It works just like a normal general practice,
except in the middle of nowhere without electricity, indoor plumbing, and a
limited amount of supplies to provide. Regardless
of the complaint, every patient gets seen which sometimes drags our 8 am to 3
pm workday out to 5 or 6 pm.
Photos from the Multi-day clinic:
Patients are seen either individually or in families upwards
of 5 at a time. Supplies such as soap,
toothbrushes, condoms, children’s multivitamins, etc are donated to the
Floating Doctors efforts and handed out as we see fit. At baseline, everyone gets soap and
toothbrushes. The pharmacy provides what
it can at no cost to the patient’s, however it becomes difficult to treat when
you run out of amlodipine for a hypertense patient or don’t have enough insulin
for a diabetic. The importance of health
educations comes to light when dealing with patients with complicated medical
conditions.
Views from the walk through Ensenada:
Health education and at non-pharmaceutical treatment are some
of the most advantageous solutions that we can provide in these rural
islands. While some medical companies
only set up, distribute medical supplies, then leave, the Floating Doctors
strive to help patients understand what is happening with their bodies and
teach them how to better care for themselves.
After two full days of medical clinic, we spend an hour or two on the
third day following up with patients from the previous days for rechecks or to
present them with alternative treatments if the first solution did not
work. In another 12 weeks, we return to
the same community to repeat the process.
- Nicole
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