I have to say, these weeks of volunteer work were probably my least favorite time of the program. It isn’t that I didn’t enjoy volunteering, but more that I felt I never did anything valuable. I was looking forward to making a difference and fulfilling jobs that needed to be done, but that wasn’t really the case. I really just spent time observing. Despite this, I did get to work on my Spanish, observe some interesting consults, help with some serious emergency situations with the Bomberos, and teach a group of children (who had zero interest in dancing) how to do yoga and dance. I was exposed to situations I had only heard about, giving me a whole new perspective to life in general.
Sadly, Yoganza was a huge fail. The kids were not into learning ballet or yoga, and sort of refused to move. We would ask them questions about their day, and they would respond with a head nod, or just not respond.
I think many factors contributed to our class not working. First of all, the kids were an average age of 10-12. At this age, you start to develop an attitude and decide that you aren’t going to do anything. These kids were definitely in that stage. I think there was also a cultural barrier (more so than the language). When two white skinned, blonde, from “rich” United States girls come into a room with their computer full of music and over-enthusiasm about dance and yoga, and try to teach a bunch of kids from a poor community how to dance (when yoga and ballet aren’t even a part of Guatemalan culture), there is a large disconnect.
Many kids grow up hearing about how amazing the United States are, and how people who come from the States should be held in a “higher respect” because they have money and security. Rachel and I obviously don’t think that, but it is difficult to change the mentality of anyone when they have grown up surrounded by a certain idea. I think we would have done better to start the class by saying “we are equal to you and only want to teach you some dance and have a fun time.” Maybe then, it would have functioned a little better.
Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday afternoons I was at the Red Cross. I helped take blood pressure and weigh patients, and was able to watch every consult with the doctor. Usually, there were about 7 patients each afternoon.
The Red Cross is not a free clinic, so it is not as busy as the public hospital because many people cannot afford it. In addition, many people do not know that the Red Cross has a doctor… many people think it is just a basic clinic with an ambulance service.
Most of the patients that come in realize that the doctor is an orthopedic, so they come in with specific problems. I saw many X-rays and broken bones, and may have slightly improved my ability to look at an X-ray? Luckily, I didn’t see any more horrifically infected stitches.
What I did notice is that the doctor was not a huge fan of conservative care. EVERYTHING required surgery. I know I am not a doctor, but I think some of the conditions could have improved with a less invasive treatment option. He also liked to write a million prescriptions for each patient. The problem with this is that many of the patients could not afford the operations or medications.
The worst condition I saw (within the past three weeks) was a man (I think 50-60 years old) that had been suffering from hip pain for 9 years. When he finally came into the office, he could barely walk. We took an Xray, and it showed two hip sockets entirely destroyed to the point where bone was rubbing up against bone. The only cure for this was total hip replacement, a surgery that costs 45,000 Q for one hip (that’s about $6,000 USD). After a few months, he would have to get the other hip done. But, he couldn’t afford one hip, let alone two. He began crying in the office, not knowing what to do. The doctor did not have any suggestions. It was hard to see, and I had an urge to just give him the money to get the surgery done.
My time with the Bomberos was definitely my favorite. There was a lot of waiting time, but during that time I got to talk to the other Bomberos and watch Spanish TV, which is really helpful with comprehension. One day, Aeja and I spent about 2 hours teaching the guys curse words in English. In return, they taught us the same in Spanish. The Bomberos really appreciated our help and even presented us with certificates the day we left.
Week 4, we just had one emergency. There was a woman that had a really bad migraine and super high blood pressure and nausea. We picked her up to take her to the hospital. While in the ambulance, she began puking all over. It was my job to hold the bucket to catch the puke. Xela streets are the exact opposite of smooth, and when you are racing down the road, liquid splashes around a lot. Add that to the sound of puking and the smell inside the ambulance… and I was lucky I also didn’t start throwing up.
Week 5, we got a call that there was a woman passed out in the middle of the street. She was an elderly woman, and completely alone. She either did not understand our questions or could not respond, because she gave us nonsensical answers to questions such as “what is your name,” “where are you from,” and “how old are you.” She did not have any information on her, making it extremely difficult to identify her condition and contact any family she may have had. I have to admit, I’ve never really thought about receiving a patient that has no family members and cannot respond to any questions. I knew it existed, but like every experience I have had here, it is different when you are living it.
Week 6 was a bloody day. We had an emergency right when I got to the station at 8am. When we arrived, there was a guy who had an accident on his motorcycle. He was breathing and bleeding a little, but the most urgent condition was the spinal pain he was having and his unwillingness to move his back to lie down on the stretcher. We took him to a private clinic and the nurses took him at the door.
The second emergency involved a shooting at an automobile mechanic store. There was a negotiation that I suppose had gone awry, and a robber showed up to the store with a gun. There was a father and a son, and both were shot. When we arrived at the scene, the robber had fled and the money was gone. The robber had good aim. The father had a bullet that entered just under the heart and came out his back. When we arrived, he was surrounded by a pool of blood and as white as a ghost, but still alive and breathing.
The son had a bullet lodged in the left side of his thorax. He did not have as much external bleeding, but judging by the swelling of his abdomen and the pain he complained about, there was some serious internal bleeding going on. We helped get out the equipment to administer oxygen, and moved the stretchers, but because we did not have any training, Aeja and I could not do much to help. As a result, we sat up front in the ambulance while the two Bomberos took care of the patients in the back.
I thought riding in a chicken bus was scary, but riding in the front seat of an Ambulance is probably one of the scariest things I’ve done. We went at full speed through the streets almost hitting at least 5 people. In addition, Xela roads are not designed like city roads in the US, so emergency lanes don’t exist. As a result, I’m pretty sure we almost hit, or at least sideswiped, at least 5 cars as we raced to the hospital.
When we got there, the patients were rushed into ICU. Unfortunately, the nurses shoved us out of the room, so we didn’t really get to see any of the emergency care (we understood, but were still slightly disappointed). About 2 minutes later, we saw the son leave for surgery. After helping record all the information, dealing with the press (who were swarming), and cleaning all the blood out of the ambulance, we headed back to the station.
The next day, the story was in the paper. The father died, and the son is still in intensive care. Money is a dangerous thing.
On our way back, we got another call. When we arrived at the scene, there was a man, probably about 40 years old, passed out on the sidewalk with a huge gash in the side of his head, his eyeball lodged out of the socket and up towards his forehead, and blood flowing out of his ear. The creepiest thing about this emergency was that nobody was around him. We didn’t know who made the call, or what had happened to the guy.
We wrapped his head and applied pressure to try and stop the bleeding, and rushed him to the hospital. When we got him to the ICU, he suddenly woke up and started getting really aggressive, trying to get off his hospital bed, wrestling with and kicking the doctors that were trying to hold him down. Again, the nurses kicked us out of the room, so we went back to the ambulance to wait until the Bomberos were ready to go.
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