S'mores anyone?

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1/16/19

Today we had another full day on our specific units. In the morning, some of us got to go observe in the OR. I got to observe a thyroid surgery and a continuous ambulatory peritoneal dialysis catheter removal. Their operating room was run similarly to the operating rooms in the US. For example, they maintained a sterile field, did a timeout, and counted the supplies at the end of the surgery. After lunch, Sarah and I returned to our Neuro unit where one of our patients had passed away. It was interesting to observe the way that they performed post-mortem care. They cleaned the dead body and then dressed the patient in traditional Thai clothing before allowing the family to come say their goodbyes. Once the family came, the family and the nurses recited a prayer around the patient’s bed. Also, Sarah and I were able to watch a doctor remove an EVD. They did not use lidocaine to stitch back-up where the EVD was removed because the doctor thought she would only have to place one stitch but ended up having to place two. Also, we realized yesterday that they do not perform a full body assessment on any of their patients, just a focused one. The manager wants us to demonstrate a full body assessment to their staff to improve quality improvement. They are very educational and open to hearing how to improve the care of their patients. Furthermore, one of our patients yesterday only urinated 50mL in 8 hours, but they did not have a bladder scanner to check how much urine was in the bladder, therefore, they placed an ice pack on the patient’s bladder to help stimulate his urine, before they considered a foley catheter.

After our full day in the hospital we spent the rest of the night with our buddies. They taught us how to make dinner over charcoals, they called it pork-pan. We placed the vegetables and the meat in a metal container over a little charcoal firepit. We ate our whole meal with chop sticks, which was quite an accomplishment for me, because I am not very coordinated with chop sticks. After dinner we taught our Thai buddies how to make s’mores. That was their first time eating s’mores and they loved them. After we were done eating, some of the buddies started playing the guitar and singing around the campfire. It was such a fun night seeing them try a little bit of our culture.

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