Día 1

My first full day at work En La Dominicana! In the US, people love to complain about everything...there is absolutely nothing to complain about. 

First of all, I'm shocked that I made it to work alive and in one piece. I've never seen rush hour traffic like this. There were people just walking across 6 o más carriles (lanes) de traffico expecting that no one would hit them. Drivers don't use signals - just their horns. Por ejémplo, one honk means 'watch out', two honks mean 'get out of my way', one long honk means some form of profanity, and so on. And people don't use the lanes - half the time we were driving on the wrong side of the road and people were honking at each other and traffic was merging and it was just insane. Thank God I don't ever have to drive in this country. 

We finally get to work, and I'm amazed at how many people look at me and think I'm already a doctor. Seriously, families coming up to me, "Doctora, Doctora, tenemos una pregunta!?" I'm just like, "Sorry I'm not a doctor?" Bien, we finally find our head doctor, and she kind of just lets us loose. Honestly. She basically told us to go read any of the patient's charts and familiarize ourselves with them. Uhm...what? After wandering around aimlessly, another doctor finally explains what to look for, what the charts mean, etc. Then as she's about to take someone's blood, she looks at me and asks if I want to do it. Of course I want to! But I've only seen it in movies, so she decides that she'll teach us tomorrow. She makes the mistake of asking me if I want to suture a patient, and after learning that I've only ever sutured a banana, she realizes just how much she's going to have to teach us. We agree that today she'll explain everything to us, but that tomorrow we better be ready to examine new patients, take their vitals and medical history, as well as learn the art of a needle along with a suture. As the day goes on, we learn so much information, from reading x-rays to reading blood work. I just feel like a little kid again, so much to look at and learn! 

On top of all that, I realize just how lucky I am to live en Los Estados Unidos and how lucky we are to have an awesome and substantial form of health care. Trust me, I never would have expected to say that - but at least I know that when I go to any sort of doctora, I can be sure that I will be treated with sterile equipment and that all of my information is private, among other things. I felt like I was in a zoo - anyone wearing clothes that even mildly resembled scrubs or a lab coat, along with a decent amount of medical knowledge and some español could walk up to any patient, read their charts, and essentially begin to treat this patient. Not only that, but nothing is sterilized in quite the same fashion as in the US. Sure, people lavarse sus manos (wash their hands) and clean the area before any procedure, but used needles with blood are simply marked with tape and placed in a drinking cup on a desk in the room for later tests. And I don't mean an individual's room, I mean a huge room with 20 beds all filled with screaming children. 

On that note, as most of you know, me and children don't exactly go together. But I'm doing much better than I had initially expected. I can handle seeing the sick children, and I'm learning to deal with all of the crying and bloody murder screams. But, I do think that my future lies elsewhere. 

Bueno, yo necesito una siesta (well, I need a nap). It was a long day, and I know that tomorrow will be filled with even more to learn and do. Until then, tiene un día maravilloso! (have a wonderful day!)

PS. I'm going to do my best to take pictures of the crazy traffic and other oddities of the country, so trust me - pictures will come!