Post Service Reflection Over the course of time that myself and the other members of my group spent at Medshare’s National Headquarters and Southeast Region Distribution Center, I gained a valuable experience and broadened my horizons with regards to the international medical aid that the non-profit Medshare provides around the world. The staff and crew that serve at Medshare’s Southeast Region Distribution Center, all have different backgrounds and stories as to how they originally connected to the organization. Some members of the crew included individuals who went to university and received undergraduate degrees in the disciplines of Pre-Med, International Business, and Human Services, while other older members of staff included doctors …show more content…
While maintaining environmental awareness, Medshare truly strives to provide healthcare to developing communities in need around the world. In addition to providing tools and equipment, Medshare strives to educate and send Medical Mission Teams to the countries that they work with in order to maintain consistent medical care for the people of that region. Alone, knowing that the work that we were doing held true significance behind the health of an individual I will never meet was incredible. The experience of working at Medshare was quite humbling, I am currently less than an hour away from the nearest hospital and have access to immediate care when necessary whereas the people that Medshare serves have limited if any access to medical assistance. As cliche as it may sound, I often overlook how fortunate I am to have access to educated healthcare professionals within the United States. Volunteering at Medshare simply furthered my longing to work in the medical field, while also opening my eyes to the work that I could potentially do internationally. Although the work that we did seemed so insignificant, but the impact that it will have on others lives is quite …show more content…
This may seem like a small task, but it required all of the time we had devoted to working with them. In order to better understand the complexity of the work that was carried out, one must look at how Medshare collects the medical supplies that they send to countries in need. Medshare collects medical supplies from hospitals and even large corporations for a variety of reasons. By collecting from medical supplies distributors and hospitals Medshare is also diverting large amounts of medical products from landfills. As we worked at Medshare, we sorted medical supplies from large corporations as well as surplus supplies that could not be used in hospitals and then counted, weighed, and boxed individual components. What truly shocked myself and my other group members was the fact that often manufacturers will find a box that is misprinted or has a cut in the side and contains gloves for example that is unable to be sold to hospitals or consumers and is then therefore thrown away. The gloves inside the faulty packaging are perfectly fine and able to be used, but simply because the box does not follow the company 's standards for packaging it is thrown away to fill up a landfill near by. Medshare strives to environmentally stop the unnecessary disposal of perfectly good supplies into landfills while putting to
One of the most common forms of errors found in the medical field is the recycling of soiled equipment. The repeated use of dirty medical equipment is found commonly in the poor regions of the world
I will contribute to the mission of the Nurse Corps Scholarship program by continuing to provide care to individuals in underserved communities. Medically underserved communities involve racial minorities, offenders and ex-offenders, crime or abuse victims, LGBTQ citizens, people with AIDS, and those that are economically disadvantaged. I was born in the small town of Monroeville, AL. It is a great town but it does not have the best resources when it comes to health care. Most members of this town, including my family, would bypass the hospital there and go to the one in the next town simply because they feel
Cape Fear Valley is a hospital system dedicated to providing healthcare to every patient. I was recently given the opportunity to volunteer for a Cape Fear Valley Health facility, the Highsmith-Rainey Specialty Hospital. This paper will discuss the organization, Highsmith-Rainey Specialty Hospital, and my experience as a volunteer for the organization.
Tina Anselmi-Moulaye’s work as a nurse and nurse-midwife was inspiring to me, particularly in the context of the three days I spent on a Labor and Delivery unit at Peking Union Medical College Hospital in Beijing, China. As a health volunteer, she recognized her passion for traveling and women’s health and had the courage to accept a position with the Peace Corps in Mali (Anselmi-Moulaye 18). She was motivated, eager to learn, and quickly jumped in to help the midwives scrub the babies after delivery. Those personal characteristics enabled her to grow and become more effective and efficient as a global nurse. In addition, she possessed many professional characteristics of an excellent global nurse. She continually sought higher education, earning
Founded in 1984 by Dr. Robert Simon, International Medical Corps is a global, non-secular, not for profit, humanitarian organization based out of Santa Monica, California. A signatory of the Code of Conduct of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement, IMC operates according to the principles of humanity, neutrality, impartiality and operational independence. In accordance with the principle of humanity, IMC has pledged to address human suffering wherever it may be found, to protect the life, health and respect of humans beings; neutrality means that the organization does not take side or take part in political, racial, religious or ideological conflict. The concept of impartiality guides the International Medical Corps to distribute aid on the basis of need alone, prioritizing the most urgent cases with a disregard for nationality, race, gender, religious belief, class or political viewpoint. Their operational independence allows the IMC to work completely independently from the political, economic, military or any other object that donors may have, making the IMC a dunantist organization. The mission of the International Medical Corp “is to improve the quality of life through health interventions and related activities that build local capacity in underserved communities worldwide.” IMC operates with the intention of rehabilitating “devastated health care systems [to help] bring them back to self-reliance.”
We tried sending her packages but they never reached her. In order to provide basic educational supplies, I needed to pack my bags and go there. During this trip I contracted a parasite, which lead me to experiences as a patient in the hospital for a couple weeks. Until this point in my life had never felt completely helpless, powerless and disabled. Teams of health care workers came to my rescue. The ensuing illness and recovery left me with indelible memories of the compassion, empathy, and hard work of the numerous kind faced providers. I was left feeling that my care and recovery was enhanced by the team centered approach and this experience, combined with my academic interests, and passion for community service set me firmly on the path of pursuing a career in health care.
Reinventing Healthcare-A Fred Friendly Seminar was produced in 2008. The film explores the current issues in health care at that time. This paper explores the issues that were addressed in the movie and compares them to the problems of health care today.
I interacted with more people than I could count - all the while astounded by how many clinics were needed to give the underprivileged basic medical needs. This required participation in interviews on patient history and diagnostic discussions with supervising physicians. Daily, I saw the eyes of the little boy in young patients; I was reminded that it was possible to make a difference in these other countries. I had another opportunity that I did not with the little boy: I was able to form relationships with many of the terminally ill patients while serving tea and talking in hopes of boosting
Jarvis (2016) have emphasized that the health history of the person is indicative of that person’s perspective of health. In honesty, I had trouble interviewing Ms. Tina Jones in gathering her history of present illness on my first attempt in Shadow Health. As the interview progressed, my mind went blank because I could no longer think of what questions to ask. Working on a night shift definitely has disadvantages. One of such disadvantages is not being able to experience a new patient admission process. The majority part of the admission is done during the day or early part of the evening shift when the patient first arrived. I have to finished only the part of the admission that wasn’t done, such as edema measurement and Braden scale assessment.
Imagine an entire community of individuals, from doctors to massage therapists, that does not answer to any political entity or religion, yet still manages to collectively provide free healthcare services to millions of individuals in need every year. Medecins Sans Frontiers, or popularly known in the US as Doctors Without Borders, is an international NGO that does just that. The organization began in 1971 when a group of French doctors and journalists recognized the dire need for assistance in healthcare during times of war, famine, and flood in Nigeria and Pakistan. Since then, it has expanded and provides aid to over 60 countries in underserved regions across Central America, South America, Africa, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia as well and developed a mission “to deliver emergency [medical] aid to people affected by armed conflict, epidemics, natural or man-made disasters, or exclusion from health care.”(www.msf.org)
I have taken in a considerable number of things from being in the Practicum of Human Services. It has changed my whole point of view toward and my mentality toward my life. Prior to my senior year at Irving High School, I was timid, had low confidence, and maintained a strategic distance from apparently unthinkable difficulties. This class has modified the greater part of my most noticeably awful qualities. On the primary day helping the L.I.F.E. aptitudes kids, I was anxious in light of the fact that I was ungainly and socially clumsy. These qualities have not left, but rather I don't give them a chance to cripple me. The truth is, I was not by any means open to this new test at first. I would not like to be the one to blame if something turned
...the opportunity to act as a triage nurse taking weights and blood pressures of our 1600 patients and seeing first-hand how hard it must be to receive quality medical care in their country. Many walked for hours and then stood waiting to be seen in the rain. To them, medical care is more a privilege than a right. This also seems to be true in the United States where the uninsured are turned away from many hospitals to ones, which often lack the resources for expensive operations. This experience has inspired me to serve the underserved.
“Health and illness are cultural concepts because how we perceive, experience, and manage health and illness are enculturated into us by our cultural group.” (DeRosa & Kochurka, 2006, p18) As a result, for a healthcare organization to be recognized, it must spread awareness of the different types of cultures and ethnicity that it provides its services to. Consumers, especially patients, tend to be very meticulous when it comes to their care. For instance, a potential customer, may research a facility prior to their hospitalization or elective procedure. Based on the Sentara web site, any potential individual would be attracted in engaging with the organization. As a potential employee, the perceptions that one may have about this organization
For this unit, I was able to make better use of outlining techniques and course materials. As a result, writing the paper was a much more flowing process and yielded a more organized paper. I learned a great deal about determining how well others will view and understand a piece of health care information and what they need to be able to do so. I could still use improvement in making final decisions on one piece, but it has been getting easier.
At the end of volunteer services I have decided on a major, I am now striving to become a physician’s assistant. In this position, not only do I get to care for patients, but I am presented with the opportunity to change their lives. I will be able to see firsthand the diversity of cultures from around the world.