Goofin on Skype

So since I've been gone, my Grandma turned 80 and my older brother got engaged!!!  With awesome events like these happening while out of the country, Skype has been a great way to keep in touch.  Here are some pics of me skyping people at my house for my grandma's birthday party... of course there were tons and tons of people (cause that's just how the Besaw's do it) but I only snapped a few shots.  I also put some pics of my hermanita maria paz and I goofin around.  She's pretty much hilarious.

Puerto Escondido

So I survived the 6.5 hour van ride from Oaxaca to Puerto!!  I've been in Puerto Escondido for the past 2 weeks.

I'm staying with a family of 3.  Roger, his wife Sol, and their daughter Maria Paz.  Roger and Sol actually run the language/surf school that I am attending while here.  She also is the local coordinator for my program, so they are definitely very friendly people!

I'll post pics soon, i promise.  Here's one i took of Carrizalillo, the beach thats about 5 min from my house :)

Last pics from Oaxaca de Juarez

Ok so these pictures are from the last week I was in Oaxaca.  There are a couple from the week 3 clinic with Dr. Hector the pediatrician, but they're all from week 4 for the most part (4/25-4/31). 

I spent week 4 at a family practice doctor's office.  Her name is Dra. Margarita and she was really nice and seemed to enjoy her job.  It was VERY laid back and there was Air Conditioning!!!!  So I was happy.  Most of the patients would come in for basic check ups or for sore throats, fever, flu, vomiting, etc.  She'd charge children/elders 40 pesos and adults 50 pesos... that's about 4 or 5 dollars!!! So cheap.  There was one lady that I won't forget, because... well she had an infection in her vagina.  So yeah... I got a full view of this lady.  She was about 65 years old and was very worried about it.  Dra. Margarita diagnosed it as just a bacterial infection and gave her a cream and antibiotic.  She then kind of started crying when she started talking about her son being involved in the drug trade.  I had a hard time following, but it was sad to see how much she was hurting and I could tell the stress of her health and her son were getting to her.

There are also pictures of when Jenny and I went to the Central to catch a 'collectivo' to take us to a couple pueblitos where they make a lot of the artesanias that are sold in Oaxaca.  We kind of wanted to go to the source, so we went to Arrizola and San Bartolo.  Theyre known for their artesanias/alebrijes and barro negro respectively.   Collectivos are aptly named, as they basically 'collect' as many people that they can pack in the taxi and take them to a single destination.  Well it was quite the experience being packed in a little car the size of the old Toyota Corollas with 7/8 mexicans.  It was only 60 to 70 cents to get a ride to a pueblito about 20-30 min away, so it's quite a deal!

The rest of the pictures are just around Oaxaca and then at Monte Alban.  Here's a link to Monte Alban for those unfamiliar: Monte Alban Info.   Basically it is thousands of years old--built by the Zapotecs/Olmecs 500 years B.C.  So it was cool seeing buildings that were literally built before Christ walked. 

Clownin' Around

Remember how I talked about the clown show that I was dragged into in downtown Oaxaca (in my last video blog)?  Well here's the evidence...  Good times.

More Pics from 4/12 - 4/18

Couple pics from La Hospital Civil with Dr. Jacob during week 2.  Then a couple from the procession that I talked about in the vid.  The rest are from the Sunday tour of Mitla, Hierve el Agua, and the weavers of Tenochtitlan.  So basically these were all before I made that last vid, for those of you that like to keep things in chronological order. 

Video Update from Sat. April 24th

10 min update about week 3

Week 2's Clinic

Ok so I haven't been keeping up with this as much as I wanted, but I first wanted to post about my week 2 experience at La Hospital Civil.

I already talked about week 1, where I was at the public clinic-Xochimilco working with the nurses doing vaccines and then with Dr. Anna.

Like I said, Week 2 I was at La Hospital Civil. Here I was in the pediatric ward working with Dr. Jacob, who specializes in Pediatric Gastroenterology. He was absolutely awesome to work with. The days would usually start around 730am with some type of lecture presented by a medical student (it's a teaching hospital, right next to the local medical school) followed by the Attending Doctors commenting and questioning their reasoning/understanding/etc. One morning the Residents gave a run-down on a few of the patients and their treatment plans, while another morning was a talk on sepsis and the best methods of treating it. After the morning meetings, Dr. Jacob would take Dr. Maya, Cliff (A 3rd year med student at Touro Univ), and I for morning rounds. Dr. Jacob would give us the history, treatment plan, and prognosis--accompanied by lots of questions ranging from anatomy/physiology, medications, prognoses, etc.

We saw a variety of situations. I'll run through the ones I can remember off the top of my head:

• One 8-9 year old kid had nephrotic syndrome. He was experiencing some serious edema throughout his body and especially in his stomach and genital area. He was on some corticosteroids if I remember correctly--suppressing the immune system, as this syndrome is often a result of autoimmune diseases. I'll never forget this kid though... his name was Javier. Dr. Jacob tried to get him to learn some English from us, but whenever he asked him to say "Good Bye", the boy would just say it in his native dialect. He was so cute and he would always smile when answering questions. His smile couldn't get any bigger and it kind of just made you appreciate the innocence and positive attitude many of the kids maintain even in unfortunate situations.
•  Another kid had chicken pox or 'varicela'. Chicken pox is still a problem here, more-so than in the US where the vaccine is more readily available. This boy had a terrible case that had reached the point of encephalitis--inflammation of the brain. This ultimately lead to brain damage and it was sad being there as Dr. Jacob explained to the boy's mother that he may never be the same. She was very upset to say the least :(
• We saw at least 5 or 6 appendicitis cases. Appendectomy's are the most common procedures done on children.
• One 10-11 year old boy was hit by a car while he was riding his bike. He had a fracture in the temporal bone of his skull. We were able to look at his X-rays and Dr. Jacob went through the entire workup with us, as he did with every patient.
• A few young children with pneumonia. He showed us the X-rays and basically explained to us the antibiotics they use to treat it.
• One patient that was really a sad situation was in the pediatric oncology room. She had some treatment for her leukemia that pretty much killed her immune system to the point where she became terribly ill. She had bacterial and fungal infections on her skin and throughout her entire body. The next day we were informed that she had significantly improved, so that was good news.

The day of rounding would usually slow down around 11am. At this point we would just talk to the Residents or learn more about the patients. One of the days we went to lunch with Dr. Jacob and the Pediatric Oncology Dr. who's name escapes me. The food was amazing as always and it was fun to talk to them about things other than medicine.

The people at La Hospital Civil were great, and they made us feel more than welcome to come back the next week if we didn't like our new clinics, haha. I have a huge amount of respect for Dr. Jacob and all of his residents--they have a tough job and work non-stop--but they are excellent at what they do. Based on this experience I can definitely see myself working in pediatrics someday.

p.s. I'll post some pics of the Hospital along with a bunch of other pictures this weekend.