Amanda's Blogs

Day 1: Today was the day we met Dr. Lambert. Which I was extremely excited to after hearing about his story of how he came to be and the vision he wants to carry foward in his health care. It was truly inspiring! He watches over the people and has great compassion and pride with the services he wants to provide. It is going to be a great opportunity to help along in this adventure in present time and future students to come. In the culture we live in we have a tendency to take certain things for granted. Such things as the avaliability and quality of the free healthcare. Here in Dominican Republic that is something to strive towards but for us it is a way of life. It is refreshing to meet someone whose main concern is to help those less unfortunate and want to provide those services to them. I am excited to see more tomorrow!

Day 2: today was a very eventful morning. First stop was Dr Lambert's clinic in the Batey otherwise known as the slum area. I figured it would be located more outside of the town than it actually was. It surprised me to pull into such as area just by pulling off on a side street off one of the main roads since conditions of the housing were so much better only a few feet away.

They were so grateful to Dr Lambert and the clinic staff. Only great things were said about the service. One particular patient travelled from quite far away just to receive this care. The patient even allowed us to be present during her visit and tend to the ulcer on her foot. I am amazed how open and welcoming the people are in the Dominican.

Day 3: While Canadians are known to be friendly and pilite we definitely take a little Dominican culture with bus. one word that definitely comes to mind is spontaneity. We originally contacted the clinic lab to visit and by the end of the day we ended up at one that was not even contacted til earlier that day. they were welcoming and even offered up contacting other places and clinics to visit that afternoon. It was interesting to see the differences between laboratories here in the Dominican and compared to Canada. Each day has been a new surprise and learning experience and we jsut have to be willing to go along with the spontaneity of the day.

Amanda Easson
Medical Laboratory Technology Student
NSCC, Waterfront Campus