Well, this was certainly a day. We were asked to journal a bit about how it was getting back into the US and how much of a culture shock it was coming back to the United States. The trip seemed to be okay. I thought that I would study a little bit on the plane, and I did until I ran out of light, which did not take long. I don't know if anyone else really noticed, but there was a point about 2 hours into our flight which was about 4pm Costa Rica time where it was roughly 6pm United States time. If you looked out your window (which I was) you could see where daylight ended and evening/night time was setting in it was almost like a line in the sky ... it was cool!
I tried to get some pictures, but I could not really get a good one, but as you all know my other pics can be seen on my facebook. We had our flight back to North Carolina, and then went back to Buffalo. Surprisingly, going though customs was easy and getting everything we needed to hop the next plane was easy too. Everything went very smoothly getting back into the country.
I guess coming back into the country was a bigger culture shock than leaving it, but I don't know how many others shared my opinion. It seemed to me like the states are so busy. Everyone has somewhere to go, or something to do and we do not really stop to enjoy the moment. I realized this when I was getting ready to board my plane to get back to buffalo. I guess that we here in the states are so concerned with what is coming next that we don't see what we are given. It is disappointing really. You see, in Costa Rica they believe in PURA VIDA or the beautiful life. It is very similar in comparison to our Hakuna Matata. Pura Vida is their most common saying and it is said everywhere to everyone. I guess that is one of the reasons that I did not want to leave Costa Rica. I was able to really enjoy and appreciate my life down there. Not that I don't appreciate what I have in the states, but I got to really enjoy what I saw. I learned to be thankful for what I have here at home, the education that I am receiving, my family, and my boyfriend. I saw some things in Costa Rica that a camera couldn't even capture. I really did learn the whole meaning of a beautiful life. It seems that people of Costa Rica do not stress about things. It is almost like they have no worries, or if they do- they do not burden others with it. I think that we do that a lot here in the U. S and I am guilty of it for sure. Everything is very fasted paced here in the states and in Costa Rica, everyone just takes each day as it comes. I learned a lot in Costa Rica and I hope to go back someday. Thank you all for reading and going on this adventure with me : ) it really does mean a lot.
-Kara
Thursday, April 19, 2012
Thursday, April 12, 2012
Day 11, Day 12
Hello Everyone,
If you are just reading this in your e-mail or whatnot, you are going to realize that I have been home from the beautiful Rich Coast for about 2 weeks now. However, internet was not really working the last couple days that I was there, and we were very busy so I am adding what you guys missed of my adventure. Day 11 and Day 12 kind of go together so I put them in the same blog. You have seen me do this before!
Day 11:
Today was very interesting. We went to one of the Elementary Schools. I wish that I had my camera so that I took a picture of the school because to cross from one side of the school to another you had to go outside. It was basically like and open outdoor school, which makes it horribly uncomfortable when it is raining. However, it is their dry season, so it really does not rain much down there this time of the year. We went to a school that roughly translated as "the heart of Jesus school". The class was split up into 2 groups and one group (the one I was in) went to this school and then the other half of us went to another school. The second day we switched!
So on this day, the nurses gave us the job of education. As always we know that it is the nurses job to educate the patients. However, the community health nurse also goes into schools to educate the kids on good healthy habits. The ones that we educated on today were hand washing, healthy foods to eat and good teeth brushing. We did this for every group of kids before they went in with the nurses to get their hearing, vision and immunizations checked. We also learned how to make really cool paper boxes that the nurses use as little garbage boxes. I also fell at the school today in front of about 40 kids, that was embarrassing, but nothing stops me from getting back on my feet again. Haha. It was soooo funny now that I look back on it, and I didn't even cry! hahaha. The most amazing part of the day is that we were viewed as being famous to the kids. It was so interesting. I don't know what it was about us, but we were swarmed at recess and afterschool with kids coming up to us with pens and notebooks asking us for our autographs. I must have signed 100 books, and the kids wanted us to sign their arms. It was so interesting. I had some of them sign my book too. It was so much fun. They were taking pictures of us on their cell phones, and writing down our names, and getting our signatures. It was great! I am not sure why there was this reaction, but if I had to guess, I would say that it was because we were different, older than they were, all dressed the same in our uniforms, and from another country to which most of them have never been. We did find a couple of students at the school that had been to the U.S to visit family members.
Courtney and I also got to give a small lecture on the pulmonary system during their class. It was so hard because we had to do the whole presentation without preparation (on our feet) in Spanish! ahhhhh. Talk about ultimate confusion and boy was I embarrassed because I was clearly not pronouncing things correctly and I don't even think that I was making sense at some times. However, we did get to teach them the head, shoulders, knees and toes song in English and we sang it with them in Spanish. It was a bigger task than I had planned, however it was so fun and the kids were amazing!
After our day at the school, we went back to the hostel for dinner and shopping in downtown Desamparados.
Day 12
Today was the day that my group got to go to the other school! This school was very different in the way that it was structured and still, it was like going to class outside. Today my group was responsible for doing all the tests. We got to do the vision and hearing tests, height and weight, and organized immunization papers (this was my job). So let me tell you a little bit about how each test worked.
Vision test: You know when you go to the doctors and they make you read all the funny little shapes or read the letters off of a chart while covering one eye? Yep, that is the Vision test here too. However when working with the really little kids who dont know all their letters yet, they use shapes (stars, hearts ...etc.). It was really interesting to see how many of the children really did need eyeglasses, but did not even know it!
Hearing Test: Most of you probably remember the hearing test when you were small. The nurse gave you the giant head phones to wear while she pressed buttons on an old machine. She/he would instruct you to raise your hand when you heard the beep in each ear and so on... However, different story down here in Costa Rica. It was our job to put cotton in the child's ears (one at a time) and stand about 2 feet behind the child and whisper a word in the child's ear the did not have the cotton ball in it. They were then told to point to a picture of the word on the desk in front of them. The "game" went like this ... Courtney would whisper (for example)"Mariposa" which means butterfly in the child's ear from about 2 feet away and if the child heard it, he would point to the picture of a butterfly (among many other pictures) on the desk. Court would continue this with different words 3 times in each ear.
Height and weight were basically the same except the scales were in kilograms and not in lbs, and height was measured in meters or cm ...not inches and feet.
Then there was my task. Each child was told that the nurses were coming to the school to visit and they needed to bring their immunization booklets (we have them in the US too.... I just found mine). It is usually kept by the parents and all immunization records are kept in this child's book. However, not all children remembered their books. It was my job to erase (in all the books) their age next to the immunization in the book, put today's date in pen and then in pencil write 20 anos next to it. Which means they get the next vaccine at 20 years old. For those with no book, I had to write their names on a small card and do the same thing. However, I also had to keep track in the nurses roster (which I wrote out all by hand) what kids were getting their DT shot today. This became very Chaotic when some of the children had the same names or same first and middle name but different last name, or didn't have their name on their book... etc. I was exhausted by the end of the night. A special thanks to Victor for all the help he gave me at the school. We celebrated Katies birthday when we got home by having a surprise party for her, we had all kinds of stuff on the grill ( Thanks Danny :) ) and ended the trip right in Costa Rica :)
If you are just reading this in your e-mail or whatnot, you are going to realize that I have been home from the beautiful Rich Coast for about 2 weeks now. However, internet was not really working the last couple days that I was there, and we were very busy so I am adding what you guys missed of my adventure. Day 11 and Day 12 kind of go together so I put them in the same blog. You have seen me do this before!
Day 11:
Today was very interesting. We went to one of the Elementary Schools. I wish that I had my camera so that I took a picture of the school because to cross from one side of the school to another you had to go outside. It was basically like and open outdoor school, which makes it horribly uncomfortable when it is raining. However, it is their dry season, so it really does not rain much down there this time of the year. We went to a school that roughly translated as "the heart of Jesus school". The class was split up into 2 groups and one group (the one I was in) went to this school and then the other half of us went to another school. The second day we switched!
So on this day, the nurses gave us the job of education. As always we know that it is the nurses job to educate the patients. However, the community health nurse also goes into schools to educate the kids on good healthy habits. The ones that we educated on today were hand washing, healthy foods to eat and good teeth brushing. We did this for every group of kids before they went in with the nurses to get their hearing, vision and immunizations checked. We also learned how to make really cool paper boxes that the nurses use as little garbage boxes. I also fell at the school today in front of about 40 kids, that was embarrassing, but nothing stops me from getting back on my feet again. Haha. It was soooo funny now that I look back on it, and I didn't even cry! hahaha. The most amazing part of the day is that we were viewed as being famous to the kids. It was so interesting. I don't know what it was about us, but we were swarmed at recess and afterschool with kids coming up to us with pens and notebooks asking us for our autographs. I must have signed 100 books, and the kids wanted us to sign their arms. It was so interesting. I had some of them sign my book too. It was so much fun. They were taking pictures of us on their cell phones, and writing down our names, and getting our signatures. It was great! I am not sure why there was this reaction, but if I had to guess, I would say that it was because we were different, older than they were, all dressed the same in our uniforms, and from another country to which most of them have never been. We did find a couple of students at the school that had been to the U.S to visit family members.
Courtney and I also got to give a small lecture on the pulmonary system during their class. It was so hard because we had to do the whole presentation without preparation (on our feet) in Spanish! ahhhhh. Talk about ultimate confusion and boy was I embarrassed because I was clearly not pronouncing things correctly and I don't even think that I was making sense at some times. However, we did get to teach them the head, shoulders, knees and toes song in English and we sang it with them in Spanish. It was a bigger task than I had planned, however it was so fun and the kids were amazing!
After our day at the school, we went back to the hostel for dinner and shopping in downtown Desamparados.
Day 12
Today was the day that my group got to go to the other school! This school was very different in the way that it was structured and still, it was like going to class outside. Today my group was responsible for doing all the tests. We got to do the vision and hearing tests, height and weight, and organized immunization papers (this was my job). So let me tell you a little bit about how each test worked.
Vision test: You know when you go to the doctors and they make you read all the funny little shapes or read the letters off of a chart while covering one eye? Yep, that is the Vision test here too. However when working with the really little kids who dont know all their letters yet, they use shapes (stars, hearts ...etc.). It was really interesting to see how many of the children really did need eyeglasses, but did not even know it!
Hearing Test: Most of you probably remember the hearing test when you were small. The nurse gave you the giant head phones to wear while she pressed buttons on an old machine. She/he would instruct you to raise your hand when you heard the beep in each ear and so on... However, different story down here in Costa Rica. It was our job to put cotton in the child's ears (one at a time) and stand about 2 feet behind the child and whisper a word in the child's ear the did not have the cotton ball in it. They were then told to point to a picture of the word on the desk in front of them. The "game" went like this ... Courtney would whisper (for example)"Mariposa" which means butterfly in the child's ear from about 2 feet away and if the child heard it, he would point to the picture of a butterfly (among many other pictures) on the desk. Court would continue this with different words 3 times in each ear.
Height and weight were basically the same except the scales were in kilograms and not in lbs, and height was measured in meters or cm ...not inches and feet.
Then there was my task. Each child was told that the nurses were coming to the school to visit and they needed to bring their immunization booklets (we have them in the US too.... I just found mine). It is usually kept by the parents and all immunization records are kept in this child's book. However, not all children remembered their books. It was my job to erase (in all the books) their age next to the immunization in the book, put today's date in pen and then in pencil write 20 anos next to it. Which means they get the next vaccine at 20 years old. For those with no book, I had to write their names on a small card and do the same thing. However, I also had to keep track in the nurses roster (which I wrote out all by hand) what kids were getting their DT shot today. This became very Chaotic when some of the children had the same names or same first and middle name but different last name, or didn't have their name on their book... etc. I was exhausted by the end of the night. A special thanks to Victor for all the help he gave me at the school. We celebrated Katies birthday when we got home by having a surprise party for her, we had all kinds of stuff on the grill ( Thanks Danny :) ) and ended the trip right in Costa Rica :)
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
Day 10
Hola Mi Amigos!
Hope everyone is doing well today! I know I am!
Got up this morning around 6:15- slept in a little bit by accident! woops, but we are at the hostel now and not at Franks house down the road, so I don't have to worry about getting up so early. I took a shower and moseyed on to breakfast which was eggs and ham. YUM. We all boarded the bus at about 7:30 ish and headed to the clinical place. Today was great! No mountain climbing though. I will actually say that I did not miss the mountain climbing because by now I must have walked about 40 miles and my new shoes that I bought the day that I got here, will be garbage by the time that I go home. My feet and ankles are killing me and today my knee started hurting! MOMMMMMMMYYYYY where are you!!?! lol. Okay done complaining now!
I got to the clinic and got to shadow a nurse who walks around the city. It was a lot of fun. We had 10 different houses to visit today and ended up seeing about 12 houses. You could tell that the nurse that I was with today absolutely loved her job. They do a lot of patient education and primary preventions to keep people from going to the hospital. This is called "the first step of care" here. The nurses educate on things like the importance of various things such as self breast exams, immunizations, washing hands, healthy diet, and also what to watch for if they have children (ie: swollen glands, flat feet (plantar), washing hands, and diarrhea and vomiting (due to various bacteria). This nurse carried around a big backpack as well, and to each person in the family she gave powdered electrolytes and medications to help tame the foreign bacteria that could be ingested into the system. The families seem to really enjoy when the nurse comes to see them, and it appears to be a very social aspect of their day. The kids usually love the nurses as well. I took a blood pressure today and realized that it was very high, I thought that it was my mistake so I retook the blood pressure in the other arm and got the same results, so still thinking that it was my error I asked the nurse to take the pts blood pressure and she too got the same high results as I did. The nurse immediately wrote the pt a referral for an emergency visit to the clinic. The pt told me that high blood runs in the family so the pt was not surprised by the blood pressure reading. I also got to give 2 injections today with the sterile field and I seemed to do it successfully! It was so much fun. Courtney and Gupe got to give injections today and they did such a good job! We had a great day. After we got home from the clinic, some of us went to town to go shopping at the mall or to stop and buy things I did not really buy anything except some shampoo and flowers, but it was a nice walk today. Dinner was amazing as usual we had beans, rice, steak pieces with sauteed peppers and a traditional Costa Rica salad that I do not know the name of and it was soooooo good, I put it in some small tortillas. SO YUMMY !! Now it is time to go to bed :)
Goodnight Family!
-Kara Kelly ..
Hope everyone is doing well today! I know I am!
Got up this morning around 6:15- slept in a little bit by accident! woops, but we are at the hostel now and not at Franks house down the road, so I don't have to worry about getting up so early. I took a shower and moseyed on to breakfast which was eggs and ham. YUM. We all boarded the bus at about 7:30 ish and headed to the clinical place. Today was great! No mountain climbing though. I will actually say that I did not miss the mountain climbing because by now I must have walked about 40 miles and my new shoes that I bought the day that I got here, will be garbage by the time that I go home. My feet and ankles are killing me and today my knee started hurting! MOMMMMMMMYYYYY where are you!!?! lol. Okay done complaining now!
I got to the clinic and got to shadow a nurse who walks around the city. It was a lot of fun. We had 10 different houses to visit today and ended up seeing about 12 houses. You could tell that the nurse that I was with today absolutely loved her job. They do a lot of patient education and primary preventions to keep people from going to the hospital. This is called "the first step of care" here. The nurses educate on things like the importance of various things such as self breast exams, immunizations, washing hands, healthy diet, and also what to watch for if they have children (ie: swollen glands, flat feet (plantar), washing hands, and diarrhea and vomiting (due to various bacteria). This nurse carried around a big backpack as well, and to each person in the family she gave powdered electrolytes and medications to help tame the foreign bacteria that could be ingested into the system. The families seem to really enjoy when the nurse comes to see them, and it appears to be a very social aspect of their day. The kids usually love the nurses as well. I took a blood pressure today and realized that it was very high, I thought that it was my mistake so I retook the blood pressure in the other arm and got the same results, so still thinking that it was my error I asked the nurse to take the pts blood pressure and she too got the same high results as I did. The nurse immediately wrote the pt a referral for an emergency visit to the clinic. The pt told me that high blood runs in the family so the pt was not surprised by the blood pressure reading. I also got to give 2 injections today with the sterile field and I seemed to do it successfully! It was so much fun. Courtney and Gupe got to give injections today and they did such a good job! We had a great day. After we got home from the clinic, some of us went to town to go shopping at the mall or to stop and buy things I did not really buy anything except some shampoo and flowers, but it was a nice walk today. Dinner was amazing as usual we had beans, rice, steak pieces with sauteed peppers and a traditional Costa Rica salad that I do not know the name of and it was soooooo good, I put it in some small tortillas. SO YUMMY !! Now it is time to go to bed :)
Goodnight Family!
-Kara Kelly ..
Days 7-9
Hello Family and Friends!
I hope that you are all having a good week thus far! I heard that it has
been really warm at home lately. Go figure- beautiful weather when I am not
even in the states. However, it is absolutely beautiful here! I am going to split
up this blog into 3 parts. What I did on Friday, Saturday and then Sunday.
Friday:
Today was one of the best days that I could have had. We got up really early
in the morning and drove 2 hours on the bus so that we could go Zip Lining! For
those of you who are unsure of what this is- I'll explain. There are many long
cables that are attached from one tree to another high in the Rainforest. There
is (what looks like) a pully system that is attached to your body and you wear
a harness. Attached to the harness is 3 "ropes" with Karabeaners
attached (you will see these get-ups in the pictures). These 3 Karabeaners
attach to the pully system that I was telling you about, and you grab on and
just fly across the cable. It is wonderful because you can look all around at
the view of the rainforest- Its BEAUTIFUL. We had 3-4 amazing guides that were
with us running the Zip Line Trip. The Leader's name was YiYo. He was so fun.
The tour guides made all kinds of jokes with us, laughed and played just like
we had been friends for a long time before. They also enhanced our trip by
letting us do a Tarzan Swing (just like it sounds- you are attached to a giant
rope that is not attached to anything else but a tree above you and you fly on
one rope over a section of the forest. It was just like a swing.
It was very safe and the boys were very intelligent, they knew what they
were doing to a tee! The last part of Zip Lining was possibly the best one. The
tip of the Zip (aka: time in the air) was a total of 45 seconds. We did the
superman through the air. We were put in a body harness and flew over the
rainforest with free hands and all. It was the neatest experience. Some of us
were more afraid than others, but everyone made it and it was a blast!
After Zip Lining we drove about one more hour to a beautiful place called
THE HOT SPRINGS!!! This place was, As Katie F calls it “Heaven”. It was so
beautiful! It was tropical and absolutely wonderful. The water was very warm. I
first sat in a spring that was about 103 degrees and then Dr. Kozub and I
ventured out and went in a pool about 156 degrees! It was so hot. It took a lot
of coaxing to get in, but once we were in it was awesome and felt really good
on my back, knees and everything else that is basically killing me. When we got
out of this pool, out skin was RED!
After we got out of the hot springs we went and took some beautiful pictures
of what was around the area. Flowers, plants, pools, etc…. I will post these
pics as soon as the computer connection is strong enough to do so. I will label the pictures accordingly. After
we took those pictures, we all went to dinner as a group which came with the
hot springs package that we bought. It was a buffet, all you can eat and let me
tell you … it was Delish!
Saturday:
Today we went to la playa!!! (THE BEACH!) Manuel Antonio was the name of it.
It was absolutely amazing. A wonderful day- it was so hot and so beautiful!
This beach was everything you could ask for in a beach and a THANK YOU to Danny
for taking us. It was literally a perfect day and I couldn’t be happier. It
took about 3 hours or so to get to this beach but EVERY BIT OF IT WAS WORTH IT!
When we first got to the beach we went on the nature tour. It was literally
about a 2 mile walk through a jungle area. I saw a ton of animals- I saw
Monkeys, Deer, Tucans and I SAW A SLOTH! I was so happy that I saw this sloth
that I think I cried tears of joy! After I got out of this national park I went
and called home! I went to go and change my bathing suit and Dr. Kozub saw a
phone line that only costs $1.00 to call out to the US for 5 minutes. So, I was
really missing my family and it was Naunies B-Day (HAPPY BIRTHDAY NAUNIE!) so I
made a few calls back to the states. It was really good to hear every ones
voice and I was so very happy. After I got to talk to my family I went and got
in my suit and headed to the sand. It was gorgeous bright blue light blue
water! I loved every second that I was there. I loved it so much in fact that
Katie F and I dumped all the money we had out of our pockets and went
PARASAILING! We took a chance on something we both wanted to cross off our
bucket list, and WE DID IT. No regrets and we didn’t look back. It was one of
the most amazing moments of my life being lifted off the ground by the biggest
parachute that I have ever seen and then realizing that you are only being held
in the air by a thin piece of cloth, realizing at any minute you could fall to
the ocean below. It was amazing, and I could see the sea go on for miles and
miles. Katie and I ran and ran until the parachute picked us up and I could
have sworn that we were flying. We were a half mile into the sky and we both
agreed that we felt so alive. Not many people get the chance to cross something
off their bucket list at 21 years old. I can say that it was the most thrilling
moment of my life. It trumped the fear I have from the Zip Lining. I have
learned some very important lessons here in Costa Rica. The most important is
to LIVE FOR TODAY. I cannot tell you how many days I spend worrying about
tomorrow or what lies ahead in life. You have to enjoy the moment, and I always
have been told this, but it never really sunk in until this Trip. I have lived
my life to the fullest here and I could not be anymore blessed with the gift
that God has given me. I have been blessed to meet Danny, Dona Edith and Don
Daniel and have Katie F here to share in some of the memories I will have in my
life. I did something so spontaneously today that I even shocked myself and my
parents… and Zac (I don’t think that any
of them really believed me when I told them). I learned that you have to be
happy right now, in the moment that you have because really we are not guaranteed
tomorrow, and if you spend all day today worrying about it- it is a day that
you have wasted that God gave you. (I owe someone a thank you for teaching me
this- I tend to forget)…. So now that the mushy part is over- I got to finish
my day with the most beautiful sunset in the world that I have ever seen, and
Zac I wish you were there- you would have loved it! My breath was just taken
away by what my eyes were seeing. I have ONLY DREAMED of seeing what I saw
today. Thank You Dr. Peterson, Dr. David and Dr. Kozub for pushing so hard to
get this chance for us, it’s an irreplaceable gift.
Sunday, March 18, 2012
Day 6
Day 6
Good Morning Everyone. Oh my, I can’t even explain the day that I had. I woke up very early around 6:08 or so, showered and got ready for my day. We had breakfast and the bus picked us up around 7 or so. We headed to a place that is very similar to a small clinic where we get to observe community health nurses on the job! It was so much fun. Matt, Gupe and I climbed one of the mountains with one of the nurses to visit families in their homes! The nurse’s main job today was to make sure that all families were caught up on their vaccinations. This job is very important for the community health nurse because there are a lot of different bacteria’s and germs that can be spread out through this population. Everyday this nurse walks 2 miles up a mountain that is just a small rocky dirt path and she wears long pants and a long shirt to protect her from the sun, which by the way- it was about 85 degrees the day we went. With her she carries (up the mountain everyday!) a FULL backpack of patient/family files, sun block, blood pressure cuff, stethoscope and many other things. She also carries a big blue lunch cooler about 5-7 lbs, and more patient files and records. The nurse herself only weighed about 100lbs soaking wet, and she does this every day, and she told me that she LOVES her job. SHE LOVES DOING THIS. I was just so amazed at her enthusiasm. Most of the houses that I saw today were just made of very thin plywood and pieces of tin lay over the roof. Some had electric, water, TVs and radios and others did not. The nurse would also do an assessment of every family and what resources that they had accessible to them (such as mentioned above). While we walked around with the nurse, she let us take blood pressures and watch her give injections. In the hospitals in the states we use a disposable sterile field, and we rub the patients arm with alcohol to clean the area before an injection is given, and we also don gloves. Here in Costa Rica they have a reusable sterile field. It is a sheet of plastic that they place all the injection stuff on to prepare it. To prepare the patient’s arm- they use water and a cotton ball. After she is done, she placed the sharps in an old plastic shampoo bottle. She would then wash the sterile field with alcohol and put it back in her back. They do not use gloves here for injections, and there was very minimal blood if any at all when giving injections so maybe it isn’t necessary here. Many people who lived in the mountains had dogs, chickens, roosters and other various farm animals that were really neat to see! We visited about 5 out of the 8 houses we needed to see because 3 of the residents were not home. We got back to “base” at about 2pm and then my whole class went out to lunch. We went to a little Mexican restaurant, and the food was amazing. I tasted my first margarita EVER, and HATED IT. Ew. I will not be drinking one of those in my life. For lunch I had these really good Taco things that I do not remember the name of, but it was just the right amount and it was very good. After lunch we loaded on the bus and headed back to the hostel, but made a quick pit stop at Walmart to buy some things for the hot springs and beach this weekend. It was nuts trying to find things in Walmart, Dad. Everything was in a different place, it did not look like the Walmarts at home, and they had a whole upstairs labeled “Zapatos” which is shoes- AN UPSTAIRS FOR SHOES. How would you like delivering here Dad? It had so much more clothing and stuff! I loved it…just kind of hard to navigate around the store. After Walmart, we headed back to the hostel and by the time we got back dinner was ready for us to have. I do not remember what dinner was called but it was amazing! Beans, rice, yummmmmmmmy! Very VERY traditional. I will be posting about Friday, Sat, and Sun all in the same blog because we did excursions – More to come soon. Sorry that I have not posted in a long time, we have been away and there has been no internet at the house.
Love,
Kara <3
Good Morning Everyone. Oh my, I can’t even explain the day that I had. I woke up very early around 6:08 or so, showered and got ready for my day. We had breakfast and the bus picked us up around 7 or so. We headed to a place that is very similar to a small clinic where we get to observe community health nurses on the job! It was so much fun. Matt, Gupe and I climbed one of the mountains with one of the nurses to visit families in their homes! The nurse’s main job today was to make sure that all families were caught up on their vaccinations. This job is very important for the community health nurse because there are a lot of different bacteria’s and germs that can be spread out through this population. Everyday this nurse walks 2 miles up a mountain that is just a small rocky dirt path and she wears long pants and a long shirt to protect her from the sun, which by the way- it was about 85 degrees the day we went. With her she carries (up the mountain everyday!) a FULL backpack of patient/family files, sun block, blood pressure cuff, stethoscope and many other things. She also carries a big blue lunch cooler about 5-7 lbs, and more patient files and records. The nurse herself only weighed about 100lbs soaking wet, and she does this every day, and she told me that she LOVES her job. SHE LOVES DOING THIS. I was just so amazed at her enthusiasm. Most of the houses that I saw today were just made of very thin plywood and pieces of tin lay over the roof. Some had electric, water, TVs and radios and others did not. The nurse would also do an assessment of every family and what resources that they had accessible to them (such as mentioned above). While we walked around with the nurse, she let us take blood pressures and watch her give injections. In the hospitals in the states we use a disposable sterile field, and we rub the patients arm with alcohol to clean the area before an injection is given, and we also don gloves. Here in Costa Rica they have a reusable sterile field. It is a sheet of plastic that they place all the injection stuff on to prepare it. To prepare the patient’s arm- they use water and a cotton ball. After she is done, she placed the sharps in an old plastic shampoo bottle. She would then wash the sterile field with alcohol and put it back in her back. They do not use gloves here for injections, and there was very minimal blood if any at all when giving injections so maybe it isn’t necessary here. Many people who lived in the mountains had dogs, chickens, roosters and other various farm animals that were really neat to see! We visited about 5 out of the 8 houses we needed to see because 3 of the residents were not home. We got back to “base” at about 2pm and then my whole class went out to lunch. We went to a little Mexican restaurant, and the food was amazing. I tasted my first margarita EVER, and HATED IT. Ew. I will not be drinking one of those in my life. For lunch I had these really good Taco things that I do not remember the name of, but it was just the right amount and it was very good. After lunch we loaded on the bus and headed back to the hostel, but made a quick pit stop at Walmart to buy some things for the hot springs and beach this weekend. It was nuts trying to find things in Walmart, Dad. Everything was in a different place, it did not look like the Walmarts at home, and they had a whole upstairs labeled “Zapatos” which is shoes- AN UPSTAIRS FOR SHOES. How would you like delivering here Dad? It had so much more clothing and stuff! I loved it…just kind of hard to navigate around the store. After Walmart, we headed back to the hostel and by the time we got back dinner was ready for us to have. I do not remember what dinner was called but it was amazing! Beans, rice, yummmmmmmmy! Very VERY traditional. I will be posting about Friday, Sat, and Sun all in the same blog because we did excursions – More to come soon. Sorry that I have not posted in a long time, we have been away and there has been no internet at the house.
Love,
Kara <3
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Day 5
Buenos Dias Everyone!
I hope everyone is having a nice day! I woke up about 6am and came to the house for breakfast (the house I am staying at is about 6 blocks away give or take)
Today was certainly busy for me. Today we toured the Biblica and Ebais and had our 3 hour Spanish Class. We toured the Biblica which is a Private Clinic. Each floor has a wall dedicated to a famous volcano that is found here in Costa Rica! You will see this in the pictures below. This private clinical was beautiful. It looked brand new on the inside. We first toured the Emergency Room and you are going to see a picture of that below as well. It will be labeled! the emergency room has about 15 beds, and there are rooms with glass doors that are used when children come into the ER because it provides more of a protection for them. The other rooms have curtains, and there are also 2 negative pressure rooms as well for certain medical conditions. In layman's terms, that is a room where the air is only circulated in that room and is in no way in contact with other rooms or the hall! The next thing that we saw were the pharmacy's. There are 3 of them- I did not get to see all 3 of them, but they all work together in the clinic to provide for the patients. The waiting rooms on the floors have wireless internet and computers for those who are waiting to see their doctors. The old hospital is connected to this clinic and is used as doctor offices now. The doctors that work here do not work for the clinic, they rent a spot at the clinic and pay to the clinic to be open there. They can construct there offices the way that they want to and see their patients at the clinic. It is very interesting. There are about 14 different rooms on the floors and there are maternity wards, ICU, ORs (that are usually used for elective surgeries). There is so much more that I more than likely can not even remember. Oh yeah- there are about 70 beds in the hospital! The average stay for a pt here is about 2.3 days because remember it is ELECTIVE or when someone gives birth (maternity), so patients are usually not here very long.
The second place that we went to was Ebais, which is like a community health center. I did not tour here, but my friend Goup and I did take a lot of blood pressures, heights and weights in order to help out the nurses! It was a lot of fun. I am coming to find that I can understand what people are saying to me, but I can not talk well... It will come with time I think!
And of Course we had Spanish School today from 1-4pm. Today was our last day. I was really sad to say goodbye to the teachers. My teacher's name was Roberto, and he is just a gem! I loved learning with him. He did not speak English, but I learned so much! He was easy to understand. Today we had different pictures and we labeled the picture in Spanish and then figured out how to ask "Where do you buy these things, where do you put these things, and when do you use these things?" We asked eachother these questions and made up replys- it was very funny! Krissy was hysterical. We also had a story read to us about the Costa Rica Climate in Spanish and had to answer questions about it (T/F) in Spanish! It was so fun!! Thank you Roberto for a wonderful day!
Pictures!
-Kara
I hope everyone is having a nice day! I woke up about 6am and came to the house for breakfast (the house I am staying at is about 6 blocks away give or take)
Today was certainly busy for me. Today we toured the Biblica and Ebais and had our 3 hour Spanish Class. We toured the Biblica which is a Private Clinic. Each floor has a wall dedicated to a famous volcano that is found here in Costa Rica! You will see this in the pictures below. This private clinical was beautiful. It looked brand new on the inside. We first toured the Emergency Room and you are going to see a picture of that below as well. It will be labeled! the emergency room has about 15 beds, and there are rooms with glass doors that are used when children come into the ER because it provides more of a protection for them. The other rooms have curtains, and there are also 2 negative pressure rooms as well for certain medical conditions. In layman's terms, that is a room where the air is only circulated in that room and is in no way in contact with other rooms or the hall! The next thing that we saw were the pharmacy's. There are 3 of them- I did not get to see all 3 of them, but they all work together in the clinic to provide for the patients. The waiting rooms on the floors have wireless internet and computers for those who are waiting to see their doctors. The old hospital is connected to this clinic and is used as doctor offices now. The doctors that work here do not work for the clinic, they rent a spot at the clinic and pay to the clinic to be open there. They can construct there offices the way that they want to and see their patients at the clinic. It is very interesting. There are about 14 different rooms on the floors and there are maternity wards, ICU, ORs (that are usually used for elective surgeries). There is so much more that I more than likely can not even remember. Oh yeah- there are about 70 beds in the hospital! The average stay for a pt here is about 2.3 days because remember it is ELECTIVE or when someone gives birth (maternity), so patients are usually not here very long.
The second place that we went to was Ebais, which is like a community health center. I did not tour here, but my friend Goup and I did take a lot of blood pressures, heights and weights in order to help out the nurses! It was a lot of fun. I am coming to find that I can understand what people are saying to me, but I can not talk well... It will come with time I think!
And of Course we had Spanish School today from 1-4pm. Today was our last day. I was really sad to say goodbye to the teachers. My teacher's name was Roberto, and he is just a gem! I loved learning with him. He did not speak English, but I learned so much! He was easy to understand. Today we had different pictures and we labeled the picture in Spanish and then figured out how to ask "Where do you buy these things, where do you put these things, and when do you use these things?" We asked eachother these questions and made up replys- it was very funny! Krissy was hysterical. We also had a story read to us about the Costa Rica Climate in Spanish and had to answer questions about it (T/F) in Spanish! It was so fun!! Thank you Roberto for a wonderful day!
Pictures!
-Kara
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
Day 4
Hola!
Day 4. Wow. Already day 4? This trip has to slow down !! I got up at 5:45 this morning and took a shower. We had to be ready for breakfast by 6:30 (we had hotdogs and eggs, and as always the best fruit I have ever had in my life). The bus left about 7:10 to go to La Hospital de Ninos! For those of you who are not sure what that is..... its THE CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL!!! Dr. Peterson- try not to be too jealous! :) This hospital is very historic and it treats kids all the way up to 13 to 15 years old. If the child was born at the hospital - they get treatment at this hospital until they are age 15. If they were not born at that hospital- they get treatment until they are about 13 years old. The hospital consists of a burn unit, cancer unit, HIV and AIDS treatments, transplant units (kidney, heart, liver, bone marrow...etc). We were told that Social work MUST BE DONE before a treatment to assess the candidates for transplant, and just like in the United States, the transplant list is very long for these little guys. Each social worker -in all (not just transplant cases) has about 15 cases, and the incidence rate for social work cases is about 455 new cases since February. In the Estados Unidos (United States) many social workers can have up to even 100 cases to handle!
The children's hospital is public and it is the ONLY HOSPITAL FOR CHILDREN IN THIS COUNTRY! They get children from all over, and coverage is equal to each and every child no matter what they pay. The idea to have this hospital just for children was started by Dr. Carlos Saenzherra in 1971. This hospital is also a research hospital and a teaching hospital for students in the country. In the future, they are hoping that they can expand the hospital to especially cover critical services and allow helicopters to land in the area. Sometimes if a child needs continued care, they may be moved to the adult hospital which is called the "program of transition". This is so that they can make room at the hospital for other children if needed. DR. PETERSON: The nurses here use the nursing process too!! They made a point to tell us- oh! and some of the nurses wear all white, old fashioned uniforms with their hats, skirts and collared top! They look amazing! Makes me want to dress like that with a hat and all. Here in Costa Rica, they also offer "room in" too! "Room in" is a term that is used to say that parents can stay with their child the while they are hospitalized.
Another point the nurses made today was that they have an evacuation plan that they follow in case of a hospital emergency.
What I got to see in the hospital was:
1. ICU
2. OR
3. Recovery Room
4. Palliative Care Office
We talked about many things here, and discussed how the children have an interesting way at looking at death. We talked about some of this in Peds. The nurse talking to us about Palliative Care said that children under 2 do not understand that they are dying so it really is not discussed with them. From age 3-6 they understand that they are going to DIE but they don't UNDERSTAND the word. From about 7-10 years old they have a magical thinking and each have a different way of looking at death ( I can't wait to see my dead dog, or I can not wait to see my grandparents ...etc) Above 10 yeras old- they really start to understand that they are going to die.
5. Heart Unit
After the tour we all took the bus back to school. In school today we did 3 activities. We read a small script about a sick man named Carlos and then read symptoms that are associated with a heart attack, appendicitis, and diabetes (of course everything was in Spanish). The second activity was that we interviewed eachother to see if we had any health problems, age, allergies and other health facts (we got to make them up), and of course again this was all in Spanish. The third thing that we did was an activity packet with pictures in them and we all discussed the pictures in Spanish.
Then we headed home for ham, rice, beans and slaw and potatoes for dinner ... so gooooood!
All in all it was a very good day, but I am sorry that I have no pictures because again I was at the hospital. No pics allowed.
Love,
Kara
Day 4. Wow. Already day 4? This trip has to slow down !! I got up at 5:45 this morning and took a shower. We had to be ready for breakfast by 6:30 (we had hotdogs and eggs, and as always the best fruit I have ever had in my life). The bus left about 7:10 to go to La Hospital de Ninos! For those of you who are not sure what that is..... its THE CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL!!! Dr. Peterson- try not to be too jealous! :) This hospital is very historic and it treats kids all the way up to 13 to 15 years old. If the child was born at the hospital - they get treatment at this hospital until they are age 15. If they were not born at that hospital- they get treatment until they are about 13 years old. The hospital consists of a burn unit, cancer unit, HIV and AIDS treatments, transplant units (kidney, heart, liver, bone marrow...etc). We were told that Social work MUST BE DONE before a treatment to assess the candidates for transplant, and just like in the United States, the transplant list is very long for these little guys. Each social worker -in all (not just transplant cases) has about 15 cases, and the incidence rate for social work cases is about 455 new cases since February. In the Estados Unidos (United States) many social workers can have up to even 100 cases to handle!
The children's hospital is public and it is the ONLY HOSPITAL FOR CHILDREN IN THIS COUNTRY! They get children from all over, and coverage is equal to each and every child no matter what they pay. The idea to have this hospital just for children was started by Dr. Carlos Saenzherra in 1971. This hospital is also a research hospital and a teaching hospital for students in the country. In the future, they are hoping that they can expand the hospital to especially cover critical services and allow helicopters to land in the area. Sometimes if a child needs continued care, they may be moved to the adult hospital which is called the "program of transition". This is so that they can make room at the hospital for other children if needed. DR. PETERSON: The nurses here use the nursing process too!! They made a point to tell us- oh! and some of the nurses wear all white, old fashioned uniforms with their hats, skirts and collared top! They look amazing! Makes me want to dress like that with a hat and all. Here in Costa Rica, they also offer "room in" too! "Room in" is a term that is used to say that parents can stay with their child the while they are hospitalized.
Another point the nurses made today was that they have an evacuation plan that they follow in case of a hospital emergency.
What I got to see in the hospital was:
1. ICU
2. OR
3. Recovery Room
4. Palliative Care Office
We talked about many things here, and discussed how the children have an interesting way at looking at death. We talked about some of this in Peds. The nurse talking to us about Palliative Care said that children under 2 do not understand that they are dying so it really is not discussed with them. From age 3-6 they understand that they are going to DIE but they don't UNDERSTAND the word. From about 7-10 years old they have a magical thinking and each have a different way of looking at death ( I can't wait to see my dead dog, or I can not wait to see my grandparents ...etc) Above 10 yeras old- they really start to understand that they are going to die.
5. Heart Unit
After the tour we all took the bus back to school. In school today we did 3 activities. We read a small script about a sick man named Carlos and then read symptoms that are associated with a heart attack, appendicitis, and diabetes (of course everything was in Spanish). The second activity was that we interviewed eachother to see if we had any health problems, age, allergies and other health facts (we got to make them up), and of course again this was all in Spanish. The third thing that we did was an activity packet with pictures in them and we all discussed the pictures in Spanish.
Then we headed home for ham, rice, beans and slaw and potatoes for dinner ... so gooooood!
All in all it was a very good day, but I am sorry that I have no pictures because again I was at the hospital. No pics allowed.
Love,
Kara
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