Blog Week 10

Today was my last day of volunteering in the clinic.  Through these blogs, I have reported my experiences in this clinic that serves under-privileged people.  I am very grateful for this experience because it allowed me, not only to shadow experienced doctors in a medical setting, but also allowed me to play an important role in the doctor-patient communication process.  As I have said, proper understanding between the doctor and the patient is crucial for the patient to receive the best treatment that he or she needs.  I am proud to say that I was part of this process and will cherish these experiences and hopefully apply these skills sometime in the future.  At the same time, I got to see how the doctors work and interact with the patients, and got feedback from some patients saying what they thought about the doctors that were attending them.  The stories that some patients told me about their past and, the ways they approach their lives living with a disease such as diabetes were extremely humbling and taught me many life lessons.  After this semester, I plan on going back starting next semester and hopefully earn more of these invaluable experiences.


After my shift was over, I went to the volunteer coordinator and told me that I had volunteered a total of 38 hours throughout the semester.

Blog Week 9

Last Friday in the clinic, I was not placed in the schedule for some reason, and since all the doctors that needed translators were already taken, the medical assistant asked me to organize patient paperwork in the special software that they use.  I had to see the patient's files and place them in the appropriate folder that belonged to that specific patient, as well as checking if the information in the paper matched the information in the computer.  This allowed me to see the behind-the-scenes work that the medical assistants do to have every patient in order.  Even the medical assistants said that it was a very tedious job but it made me realize that the proper and careful organization of patient information is also very essential to the better care of the patient, in addition to saving time for the doctor.  If the doctor wants to know something about the patient, the medical assistants can pull out the files in seconds and inform the doctor. Without this organization, a lot of time could be wasted, or more importantly, essential information on the patient could be lost.

Blog Week 8

Last Friday, I was assigned to be working with the eye doctors in the optometry wing of the clinic.  As mentioned in a prior blog, students from the UH optometry school were attending the patients and then reporting the results to the doctors in charge.  Generally, they know how to get their way through questioning a patient, but in this particular one, they needed my help.  After I was translating for the students and they left to reveal the results to the doctors, I started a conversation with this woman.  After some small talk, she told me the very sad story of why she moved to the United States with her son.  Back in a little town in a town in Mexico, she was living with her husband and one of her children.  She did not know this at the time but her son was affiliated with the Mexican cartel and was in the middle of an operation that organized the transport of drugs to the United States.  One time in the news, she heard her son's name being mentioned in the news saying that he had been killed in a shooting not very far from where they lived.  Devastated by the news, she got into a depression that lasted a couple of months and later started having some symptoms of diabetes.  After a couple of weeks, however, one of the cartel leaders called her through the phone and mentioned that her son owed them a significant amount of money and wanted her or her husband to pay them.  they called the police, but they assured them that it was probably an extortionist trying to get money out of them.  (This was very popular at this time, especially in border cities.  My mom almost gave $300 to one of these people, who claimed to be a cousin who had some problems).  However, that was not a hoax.  A couple of weeks later, the same people that had called went to their house and robbed it.  As they were leaving, she said, her husband was arriving to the house and he tried to oppose them and started to fight them.  Sadly, one of the robbers had a gun and shot him twice in the chest, killing him instantly.  She arrived to her house when policemen had surrounded the area and the body was being transported out of the scene.  I can't even begin to imagine what she must have felt when she found out what had happened.  Afterwards, her son that lives in Houston offered her to live with him over here, and she had no other option but to accept.  With her depression, she did not want to get treated, her symptoms got worse and her health deteriorated as a result.
I will always remember this story because it was so sad and it is what many people in Mexico and other Latin American countries go through and to think how corrupted the system has become.  It is such a sad situation that has escalated to a very high level and seemingly impossible to control.  I can relate a little bit to this story because living in El Paso, I get to hear the injustices and violence that happen across the border in Cd. Juarez, one of the most violent cities in Mexico.

Blog Week 7

Last Friday in the clinic was definitely one of the worst times I've ever had volunteering here.  I worked with an ER doctor that did not really know what she was doing.  The week before this the medical assistant had warned me that it was very difficult to work with her.  The reason is that as an ER doctor, she does not encounter patients with these kinds of problems.  She would question the patient normally but once outside, she would look up information online, ask the medical assistants, or even myself, questions concerning the patient's disease and wondered what the next mode of action should be.   At one point, she asked me what the best treatment would be for the person's high cholesterol, since Lipitor had resulted on mild side effects.  My opinion is that if her skills have deteriorated to this point, it would be best for the doctor and especially for the sake of the patient to stop practicing in this setting. This makes the doctor look really bad and it may be harmful to the patient's health, which ultimately, it is the most important thing.  At first, when the medical assistant told me about it, I thought that she maybe was exaggerating or just making it up, but then I got to see it first-hand and I was very surprised at what I was witnessing.

Blog Week 6

Last Friday in the clinic, I was able to work with the doctor that I enjoy the most working with.  One of the reasons why she is a very god and efficient doctor is because she lets the medical assistants transcribe her notes into the computer software that they use, and as a result, she goes from patient to patient relatively quickly.  As most days in this clinic, many diabetics attend to be treated and checked, and since most are Hispanic, I get to translate to the doctors.  The reason why I like to work with this doctor is because I can seethe attributes of a good and caring doctor and how I feel every medical professional should act in front of the patient.  Because I get to work with different doctors every time, I can compare the different ways that they show as they are dealing with a patient that does not speak English.  Unlike some doctors that tend to ignore the patient and only focus on what I say, she speaks directly to them showing care and concern, which in turn create a sense of comfort in the patient.  Outside of the examination room, in the small window of free time that we have, we talked about medically related issues as well as medical school and her work outside the clinic.  I think this attitude is essential to make a good working environment, and more importantly it enables for the better servie to the patient.

Blog Week 5

Last Friday I went to the clinic and it was a little different than the other times that I had gone.  I was in the optometry section of the clinic and, since they did not need translators in this wing, the medical assistant asked me to do some paperwork.  I had to transfer PDF files saved in the computer into the special program where they save all of the patient's information.  I had to analyze each document, place it under the patient's file and briefly summarize what the document was about and place this information as a cover sheet.  I enjoyed this work because it showed me another part of how the clinic runs.  It is essential for the patient's health to have their records straight and easily accessible so that the doctor can analyze them and make the best judgement for each case.

Blog Week 4

This last Friday in the clinic, I learned, what I felt, was the incorrect form of practicing medicine.  I stayed in for a couple of hours to help translate for a pulmonologist, who primarily saw patients suffering from diabetes and high cholesterol.  However, I had the impression that he was not very attentive or interactive with the patients and rudely made them wait in front of him while he finished with the other patient's files, which took him a couple of minutes and made some of the patients impatient.  When he started with the consult, the doctor made very little eye contact with the patients and basically talking to me so I can ask them.  Judging by the patient's body and facial expressions, they were not very pleased with that attitude or comfortable with his capabilities as a doctor.  In contrast, on past weeks, the doctors where talking directly to and making eye contact with the patients to make sure that they showed care for their well-being even though they could not understand what they were saying.  He seemed to not care for the individual person, but rather just saw them as another case that had to be solved.  I hope I am wrong about these perceptions about him because a doctor has to come across to the patient as a person who is not only willing to help physically, but also someone who is available to talk to about other problems or issues.  Looking back at past experiences, I see that when the doctors talk more to their patients, they get more comfortable with them.  This sometimes allows the doctor to dig into the patient's life to spot more problems that the patient was not aware of or had forgotten to mention, ultimately leading to a better doctor-patient relationship and the patient's well-being.

Blog Week 3

On Friday, I went to San Jose Clinic for the third week and was assigned to volunteer in the optometry wing of the clinic.  I stayed in for approximately two hours, time in which I helped the optometry student with one patient.  Last time I was in this part of the clinic, I was only called to translate background information from the patient because the students knew the directions in Spanish. This time, I stayed in during the entire eye exam and I had never imagined how intrinsic and complicated the eye and the machines used to examine them were.  The student I was with, shared a great amount of information with me so I got exposed to a lot of terminology and structures within the eye that I did not know.  The patient had just been diagnosed with diabetes and as a result, he was having some vision problems.  I feel I was very helpful in providing the patient with the information that the doctor and the student wanted to get across.  This optometry student knew very little Spanish and I could tell in several instances that he was not understanding what she was trying to say.  With a disease as serious as diabetes, there must be a complete understanding of what the body is going through and what the best course of action should be in order to get better and avoid the disease to worsen.

Blog Week 2

This second week, I went to San Jose on Friday and Saturday mornings for three hours each day.  To be honest, it was not as eventful as last week, but I still had the opportunity to help and learn.  On Friday, they assigned me to the optometry wing of the clinic.  The two optometrists present were supervising four optometry students that were actually attending the patients.  Some of the students spoke some Spanish, so they did not so much of my help trying to communicate with the patients.  However, some of them needed a little help with fully understanding the patients' background history.  One thing that I noticed last week is the great number of patients that suffered from diabetes and its great range of symptoms.  On Friday, three of the patients that I talked to suffered from glaucoma or cataracts that were a direct result of diabetes.  I was not aware of the full effects that diabetes had on people, so it was very interesting to see real cases of the extend of the disease.  Most of my time, however, I was seating down next to the medical assistant handling paperwork or answering any questions from the patients.  Even though it wasn't a very productive day at San Jose for me, I still enjoyed it since it allowed me to see another branch of medicine that I had not experienced before.

San Jose opens one Saturday out of the month, so early yesterday morning I went into the medical wing  to help doctors with translating.  They had assigned me with an endocrinologist.  It was a real pleasure to meet him because when we were not in a room talking to a patient or he was not getting ready for the next patient in a clinic office, he was very available and open to answer my questions about medical school.  Due to some lack of patients, I also was able to meet some other volunteers.  We talked about our reasons for being there and what our future plans were.  It was nice to talk to new people that are going through similar things that I'm going through.  The first three patients that the doctor saw did not need a translator but they allowed me to stay and observe the process.  Many of the patients that the doctor saw, had problems with the thyroid gland.  One of the ladies that went, had cancer in her thyroid and parathyroid and was going to have surgery to remove the glands in the next week or two.  Another man went to see the doctor for a yearly checkup.  But the case that really got to me and was very emotional to hear, was this old lady that told us her heartbreaking story.  To start off, my first impression of her was that she seemed very kind, loving grandmother (she reminded me of mine).  Then she told me to translate for the doctor that she needed a prescription of anti-depressants along with her diabetes medications.  She told me about all the horrible things that have happened to her in the span of one year.  Crying, she mentioned that she lost both her parents, one son, her house, and her husband, all in the span of this year.  Since, she is originally from El Salvador, she is never able to see her family, except for the son that she lives with here.  She said that she gets very depressed and does not want to do anything except to wait for her to die.  This really hit me deep, and I got a little bit emotional because her personality and her situation, although not as severe, resemble my grandmother's very closely.

I enjoy going to San Jose because I get to be in very close contact with people, and I feel that I can contribute to their well-being.

Blog Week 1

 The volunteer coordinator, Ms. Laura John, was kind enough to let me attend the clinic every Friday mornings and every third Saturday of every month until December.  My specific job will be to help the doctors in translating for people that are unable to speak English.  On Friday September 7th, it was my first day volunteering at San Jose Clinic. 

The doctor that I was scheduled with was Dr. Winstrom.  She is a family practitioner for more than 40 years and is currently working at Park Plaza Hospital next to Memorial Hermann, volunteering in San Jose at least once a month.  She was a very nice lady with a good sense of humor.  Every time we would see a patient, she would tell me what was wrong with them and explain in detail what she thought was the problem and why.  Most of the patients that she saw were diabetic or suffered from hyperlipidemia, but there were some that wanted regular medical checkups.  

The first two cases that I got to witness were very similar.  Both ladies had high cholesterol and diabetes mellitus.  The doctor was especially keen on the fact that the patients had to exercise and lose weight in order to lower the abnormal numbers.  She kept thinking about ways to avoid medications since they can do harm in the long run.  The main medication she prescribed was Metformin for the diabetics and Lipitor along with a vitamin called CoQ10 for patients with high cholesterol.  

The next man was exceptional in many ways.  He is an illegal immigrant from El Salvador saying that he needed help coping with stress.  He said that his mother is very sick back home but is unable to go back because he and his family need the money that he earns by working 60 hours a week for an office furniture company.  As an illegal immigrant, many employers tend to exploit and mistreat him adding to his stress.  In addition, due to the chemicals he uses, he is afraid that his lungs have deteriorated due to the inhalation.  Along with all this, he mentioned that he has a 5-year old son that he hasn't seen because he migrated and the mother has made her own life and re-married.  All this stress has caused him to lose hair, lose weight, and suffer from depression, making him seek medical attention.  

The next patients were a couple that were suffering from diabetes.  The lady was doing everything that the doctor indicated like exercising and having a healthy diet.  However, she could not convince her husband to do the same.  In addition to a bad diet, he told me that he drinks alcohol very often and his wife added that he gets drunk every time he doesn't go to work the next day. Her reaction to all this reminded me of my grandmother telling stories of how my grandpa would go out with friends almost every weekend and got home intoxicated in the morning, while having several health issues.  

One of the last patients that we got to see was a 65-year old woman that had diabetes and high cholesterol along with early symptoms of arthritis.  She was a nice lady and her way of speaking and her mannerisms reminded me of my other grandmother back home.  

This was my second time attending San Jose Clinic and I thoroughly enjoyed the interaction with the patients and listening to their stories as well as shadowing an experienced doctor as she does her wonderful work.  Being in the middle of the communication process is a great responsibility because I am helping a person get a better treatment that will improve his or her life.