Currently I am back in the states...in San Francisco for a layover before finally heading back to the Tri-Cities and my own bed! I have had a wonderful trip to Mongolia and have not only learned a lot myself but have hopefully taught some invaluable skills to people in need!
I hope you all enjoyed my little blog!
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
Monday, September 6, 2010
In Seoul, South Korea for the night
We made it to Seoul, South Korea! We have a one night layover here and then will be flying back to the US tomorrow...home by 10pm! The last day in Mongolia was busy but fun...we were able to see some friends and say goodbye, see the cancer center and the hospice care, go to the international church, and do a little more shopping! My friend, Togosoo came and said goodbye to us as we left the airport which was really nice...hopefully we manage to stay in contact!
We will be touring Seoul before we leave tomorrow and I will have about a 9 hour layover in San Franciso which will be diffcult since I will finally be SOOOO close to home!
We will be touring Seoul before we leave tomorrow and I will have about a 9 hour layover in San Franciso which will be diffcult since I will finally be SOOOO close to home!
Saturday, September 4, 2010
Shopping and touring Mongolia
Now that training is over, we have time to relax....SORT OF! We woke up early again this morning and started by touring an old Buddhist monestary that is now a museum then we met up with 3 friends we have made along the way - Togosoo (Talk-saw), TsaTsaa (Ta-Tah), and Mungun (Moon-goon) (all in their 20s so we get along great!)- and went shopping! They took us to some really neat places with beautiful items. No open air market however which surprised me. Mungun then took us to an active Buddhist monestary which was just incredibly interesting. We then came back to the hotel only to turn right around and go to another friend - Ganna's apartment for dinner with her and her roommates. Ganna is a doctor who quit her profession to work for Campus Crusades, a Christian ministry that ministers to the students. Her and her roommates are my age as well and dinner was very fun. I had a chance to show Togosoo pictures from home of my friends and family and will be giving her my WSU Chemistry t-shirt on Monday before we leave since she has her biochemistry degree and is now working towards a major (we had a few chats about quantum chem etc = CHEM NERDS!).
We have one day left in Mongolia...and it is going to be packed full! I know EVERYONE says this but seriously I cannot believe how fast these past two weeks have gone. Everyday has been filled with activity from the minute we wake up to the minute we fall into bed but it has been an amazing experience and incredibly eye opening to the fact that although healthcare in America is far from perfect...we have it pretty good!
We have one day left in Mongolia...and it is going to be packed full! I know EVERYONE says this but seriously I cannot believe how fast these past two weeks have gone. Everyday has been filled with activity from the minute we wake up to the minute we fall into bed but it has been an amazing experience and incredibly eye opening to the fact that although healthcare in America is far from perfect...we have it pretty good!
Friday, September 3, 2010
Training is OVER!
I cannot BELIEVE how fast the Emergency Training week went! Today was our last day and most exciting day...in my opinion. We trained them in CPR, spinal immobilization, triage, holistic healthcare, intubations, respiratory emergencies, and strokes then allowed them to put it all together with a double drill today! We did an explosive fire drill inside the hospital for the hospital doctors and nurses to practice with and then a car accident outside for the ambulance doctors, nurses, and drivers to practice with.
I did the makeup for the victims in each of these drills.....and it turned out REALLY realistic and pretty cool! We put bruises, cuts, blood, etc on the victims and gave them scenarios to play out. Then we put them in positions and started the "fire" and the "car crash." Then we sat back and watched...took notes...and gave them feedback when it was over.
I mostly stayed outside to watch the ambulance staff work. The ambulance doctors, nurses, and drivers are not fully trained like the paramedics and EMTs in America. They are allowed to do very little for the patient other than transport which is the root of many problems in Mongolia. Because of traffic in a city that has 1.5 million people in it and provides healthcare for the entire country, it takes ambulance drivers sometimes over an hour to reach a patient call and to transport them back to the hospital if necessary. If they aren't trained or legally allowed to perform tasks necessary to stablize patients, then that patient has a high likelyhood of dying! We gave some training to the ambulance staff but until policy changes in Mongolia there is not much more we can do. Still, the ambulance staff are incredibly intelligent and eager to learn. They can and want to do more for their patients so it was very exciting to watch them work. You could tell that they felt like they really had something to prove to everyone else. They did an amazing job and had a lot of fun during the drill.
When the ambulance drivers drove their victims to the emergency room, I got to see what the inside drill was like. The ambulance drivers handed their patients over so that the emergency room doctors and nurses now had an overload of patients and had to deal with the disaster scenario. They did not do as well as I had hoped however. They were not used to that number of patients and were not comfortable delegating. Patients were forgotten and doctors tried to do everything themselves. This is once again a problem with policy in Mongolia because nurses are not allowed to do half the tasks nurses in America do for doctors everyday. Thus a nurse will sit with a critical patient, not allowed to do much to help them, until the doctor has time to come and see that patient. It makes for an inefficient system and at times of disaster, I confused and ineffective system.
So hopefully our training helped them enough to stabilize patients. The hospital doctors and nurses DID prioritize patients from most critical to least and they did stabilize them correctly etc which was VERY good. Also hopefully our suggestions on how they can establish an effective, efficient emergency care system in Monoliga were heard and steps can begin to be taken to make things better for the healthcare system here!
Overall the drills were VERY fun and I had fun with the victims. We went to a traditional Mongolian song and dance show last night that was incredibly interesting. We got to see an orchestra with traditional Mongolian instruments, throat singers (men who sing from their deep throat and can reach about 3 notes at the same time!), and contortionists. Tonight we went to a more touristy Mongolian restaurant that has a band with a throat singer but this time is was more modern music....Mongolian rock I call it. It was very fun. We said goodbye to most of the people we worked with this past week and gave gifts and certificates, etc.
Tomorrow we are spending the day with some friends we made while being here and a couple docs from the hospital going shopping, etc. It should be a busy but relaxing day! Sunday we are going to see various churchs, maybe back to the orphange, and maybe see the cancer center with their hospice care which should be incredibly interesting!
I did the makeup for the victims in each of these drills.....and it turned out REALLY realistic and pretty cool! We put bruises, cuts, blood, etc on the victims and gave them scenarios to play out. Then we put them in positions and started the "fire" and the "car crash." Then we sat back and watched...took notes...and gave them feedback when it was over.
I mostly stayed outside to watch the ambulance staff work. The ambulance doctors, nurses, and drivers are not fully trained like the paramedics and EMTs in America. They are allowed to do very little for the patient other than transport which is the root of many problems in Mongolia. Because of traffic in a city that has 1.5 million people in it and provides healthcare for the entire country, it takes ambulance drivers sometimes over an hour to reach a patient call and to transport them back to the hospital if necessary. If they aren't trained or legally allowed to perform tasks necessary to stablize patients, then that patient has a high likelyhood of dying! We gave some training to the ambulance staff but until policy changes in Mongolia there is not much more we can do. Still, the ambulance staff are incredibly intelligent and eager to learn. They can and want to do more for their patients so it was very exciting to watch them work. You could tell that they felt like they really had something to prove to everyone else. They did an amazing job and had a lot of fun during the drill.
When the ambulance drivers drove their victims to the emergency room, I got to see what the inside drill was like. The ambulance drivers handed their patients over so that the emergency room doctors and nurses now had an overload of patients and had to deal with the disaster scenario. They did not do as well as I had hoped however. They were not used to that number of patients and were not comfortable delegating. Patients were forgotten and doctors tried to do everything themselves. This is once again a problem with policy in Mongolia because nurses are not allowed to do half the tasks nurses in America do for doctors everyday. Thus a nurse will sit with a critical patient, not allowed to do much to help them, until the doctor has time to come and see that patient. It makes for an inefficient system and at times of disaster, I confused and ineffective system.
So hopefully our training helped them enough to stabilize patients. The hospital doctors and nurses DID prioritize patients from most critical to least and they did stabilize them correctly etc which was VERY good. Also hopefully our suggestions on how they can establish an effective, efficient emergency care system in Monoliga were heard and steps can begin to be taken to make things better for the healthcare system here!
Overall the drills were VERY fun and I had fun with the victims. We went to a traditional Mongolian song and dance show last night that was incredibly interesting. We got to see an orchestra with traditional Mongolian instruments, throat singers (men who sing from their deep throat and can reach about 3 notes at the same time!), and contortionists. Tonight we went to a more touristy Mongolian restaurant that has a band with a throat singer but this time is was more modern music....Mongolian rock I call it. It was very fun. We said goodbye to most of the people we worked with this past week and gave gifts and certificates, etc.
Tomorrow we are spending the day with some friends we made while being here and a couple docs from the hospital going shopping, etc. It should be a busy but relaxing day! Sunday we are going to see various churchs, maybe back to the orphange, and maybe see the cancer center with their hospice care which should be incredibly interesting!
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Day 2 = Spinal Immobilization and Triage
Today we spent the morning teaching how to properly immobilization a patient who may have a spinal or head injury. We gave then a huge bag full of neck braces and you would have thought it was Christmas! Especially the paramedics were so happy to have the supplies and so excited to play with them and figure out how to use them. I was the model patient for all the procedures until they were broken into small groups to practice on themselves....so I got locked down onto a backboard with a neck brace quite a few times (almost sent a pic to my Mom just to freak her out...then thought better of it!). In the afternoon we taught triage...a concept that they had heard of but did not seem to know how to do or utilize if a disaster ever happened where it was necessary. We broke into three groups...doctors with Dr. Snyder, nurses with Carol, and paramedics with Bill. I started by running around between the 3 groups helping and modeling but by the end I mostly stuck with the paramedics because they needed the most practice since they would be the first in the field to see and work with a patient. Once again their eagerness to learn and practice was really neat!
Today was another good day...I believe that we have made a small impact and hopefully they will take what we teach them and teach their co-workers!
Today was another good day...I believe that we have made a small impact and hopefully they will take what we teach them and teach their co-workers!
Monday, August 30, 2010
An incredible weekend and our first day of training!
Hmmmmm I haven't written in a while...SOOOO much happened this weekend!
Saturday we went out to the countryside, had traditional feasts, and hiked up a mountain to the Buddhist temple and worship sites. It was pretty cool and absolutely beautiful. It was a little tense with the language barrier and not knowing much about each other so I just started joking with them even when I had no idea what they were saying. Laughter works pretty well to break the ice! I think they made fun of me a lot but I just dished it back and we all had a good time. They gave us fermented horse milk....absolutely disgusting....I stuck to tea. The Buddhist temple was at a site where an entire monestary and village once existed but was destroyed by the Communists so there were some pretty interesting ruins. We spent the entire day in a ger (a nomadic house) at the countryside and had a good time getting to know each other and break the ice!
Sunday we went to church and then to the children's orphanage which are linked together. It was actually really nice! I expected some run down dingy place...but it was actually nicer than the hospitals! Maybe because an American owns the orphanage and US dollars go a lot further in Mongolia. The kids are amazing...soooo cute. I want to adopt a Mongolian child now!! A couple of them spoke English and wanted to show me all kinds of things. They were cute and I hope I get to go back and spend more time with them! Then we went to the EMS center again and this time got to ride with an ambulance for a couple hours observing calls etc. It was pretty cool but pretty eye opening....nothing is urgent...they just kind of get there when they do. Traffic is terrible and pretty much everything is solved with a shot or a pill...only a woman having a baby was transferred to the hospital. After that we met up with Togosoo (Talk-saw) and Tahtah for dinner....they are 22 and 26 and the three of us get along great! Togosoo is awesome...she speaks great English and is a chem engineer doing biochem research with medical background so we have a lot to talk about. She is translating for us this week and then she is taking me shopping apparently!
Today was our first day of training...and we taught CPR all afternoon which was awesome because that is the part I am most involved in. The people were pretty interested and really into learning everything they could...which is awesome because even though their healthcare is terrible they are sooooo ready and willing to try anything to improve it. The rest of the week should go quite smoothly I believe!
It's kind of weird but although I am in a totally foreign country and things are REALLY different...I don't feel the culture shock that I expected!
Saturday we went out to the countryside, had traditional feasts, and hiked up a mountain to the Buddhist temple and worship sites. It was pretty cool and absolutely beautiful. It was a little tense with the language barrier and not knowing much about each other so I just started joking with them even when I had no idea what they were saying. Laughter works pretty well to break the ice! I think they made fun of me a lot but I just dished it back and we all had a good time. They gave us fermented horse milk....absolutely disgusting....I stuck to tea. The Buddhist temple was at a site where an entire monestary and village once existed but was destroyed by the Communists so there were some pretty interesting ruins. We spent the entire day in a ger (a nomadic house) at the countryside and had a good time getting to know each other and break the ice!
Sunday we went to church and then to the children's orphanage which are linked together. It was actually really nice! I expected some run down dingy place...but it was actually nicer than the hospitals! Maybe because an American owns the orphanage and US dollars go a lot further in Mongolia. The kids are amazing...soooo cute. I want to adopt a Mongolian child now!! A couple of them spoke English and wanted to show me all kinds of things. They were cute and I hope I get to go back and spend more time with them! Then we went to the EMS center again and this time got to ride with an ambulance for a couple hours observing calls etc. It was pretty cool but pretty eye opening....nothing is urgent...they just kind of get there when they do. Traffic is terrible and pretty much everything is solved with a shot or a pill...only a woman having a baby was transferred to the hospital. After that we met up with Togosoo (Talk-saw) and Tahtah for dinner....they are 22 and 26 and the three of us get along great! Togosoo is awesome...she speaks great English and is a chem engineer doing biochem research with medical background so we have a lot to talk about. She is translating for us this week and then she is taking me shopping apparently!
Today was our first day of training...and we taught CPR all afternoon which was awesome because that is the part I am most involved in. The people were pretty interested and really into learning everything they could...which is awesome because even though their healthcare is terrible they are sooooo ready and willing to try anything to improve it. The rest of the week should go quite smoothly I believe!
It's kind of weird but although I am in a totally foreign country and things are REALLY different...I don't feel the culture shock that I expected!
Friday, August 27, 2010
Two days into the trip and so much to tell!
These first two days of our trip have been spent touring the city and the local hospitals to get a feel for the way health care is handled here in Mongolia and to see what kind of supplies they have to work with. Mongolia contains about 2.6 million people and 1.5 million of them live in Ulaanbaatar! The traffic is terrible which causes the ambulance services to take sometimes hours before tranferring a patient to a hospital where they can receive help. Many things are very different here in Mongolia and it definately makes one realize how fortunate we are in America to have the easy access to medical assistance that we do. They do the best with what they have and are trying to make their system better in every way but resources are limited. Although I knew the healthcare system would not be as technologically advanced as in America, it was still somewhat shocking to see and experience. Even though we are only here for a few days, I hope that what we have to offer them will help immensly as they attempt to better their emergency systems (they do not even have an emergency department at the hospital!).
Today as we toured one of the bigger and nicer hospitals, we also toured their Traditional Medicine Department. The doctor there was young and very westernized (surprisingly!). He was intelligent and spoke incredibly good English. He showed us many procedures including acupuncture. He performed a quick demonstration on my arm...my first acupuncture treatment! It was supposed to help my stomach because apparently most people have stomach issues but he took them out before they could do any good I guess. Really interesting! He also read our tongues...to tell us our energy and stress level etc. He used what they call "western medicine" when taking vitals and diagnosis and then performed traditional/herbal medicine if the patient was not in critical conditions...all very different from what we know in the US.
Other than that we have been touring the city. The people are a mix of Russian, Asian, and Western styles. A few older Mongolians dress in traditional clothes and most of the younger Mongolians are wearing western styles. The people have all been very welcoming and kind. Most of them have a great desire to improve their English and love talking with us to do so. We have met a couple young Mongolian girls that have either gone to medical school or are in medical school and they have really enjoyed talking with me since I am the young American girl and we can relate on many subjects. A few doctors are taking us to the countryside tomorrow where we will get to maybe ride some camels or horses!
Today as we toured one of the bigger and nicer hospitals, we also toured their Traditional Medicine Department. The doctor there was young and very westernized (surprisingly!). He was intelligent and spoke incredibly good English. He showed us many procedures including acupuncture. He performed a quick demonstration on my arm...my first acupuncture treatment! It was supposed to help my stomach because apparently most people have stomach issues but he took them out before they could do any good I guess. Really interesting! He also read our tongues...to tell us our energy and stress level etc. He used what they call "western medicine" when taking vitals and diagnosis and then performed traditional/herbal medicine if the patient was not in critical conditions...all very different from what we know in the US.
Other than that we have been touring the city. The people are a mix of Russian, Asian, and Western styles. A few older Mongolians dress in traditional clothes and most of the younger Mongolians are wearing western styles. The people have all been very welcoming and kind. Most of them have a great desire to improve their English and love talking with us to do so. We have met a couple young Mongolian girls that have either gone to medical school or are in medical school and they have really enjoyed talking with me since I am the young American girl and we can relate on many subjects. A few doctors are taking us to the countryside tomorrow where we will get to maybe ride some camels or horses!
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