Can it be true? Real clinical exposure!!
So, just as I was starting to get a bit frustrated with the pre-med style of our clinical program, BSES hospital came in and saved the day! We arrived at BSES Hospital in Andheri (a Mumbai neighborhood near Juhu beach, yes I know you all know exactly where that is) yesterday morning. We first met with the director, Dr. Ashok Mehta, who is also a cancer surgeon. After introducing himself and asking us a bit about ourselves, Dr. Mehta proceeded to describe the hospital to us, and I'm not quite sure any of us really expected to hear exactly what he said. As he explained, BSES Hospital is run by a group called the Brahma Kumaris, and their overall aim is to provide healthcare in a setting that is based on a core set of values, including positivity, cooperativity, compassion, etc. It's a truly cool way to approach healthcare, and after hearing him speak about it, I'm quite sure that we could use more of this kind of thinking in the states. Apparently every single person that works in the hospital, from the surgeons to the janitors, go through a week long training in which they examine and meditate on a different value each day. We were given the opportunity yesterday to participate in an abbreviated module on positivity, and it was very cool. Even this short 30-45 minute exercise was very helpful, and it made me think quite a bit about how I approach the world. I would love to start meditation regularly....maybe I can go meet some crazy guru up in the Himalayas who can teach me the ways. That would rule...
Anyway, after the meditation and a tour of the hospital, we kind of just wandered around, and there wasn't much to do. I did get the chance to go into the NICU, though, and that was pretty amazing. There was a pair of twins who were born prematurely, and each one of them only weighed 1.5 kilos a piece (for those of you counting at home, that's about 3.3 pounds). They were TINY. I found out today that they were transferred to another hospital that is better equipped to take care of them, so hopefully they're ok.
I have to admit, I woke up this morning a bit discouraged, because even though I got to go to the NICU yesterday, most of the afternoon was spent wandering aimlessly. Luckily, that all changed today. I started the day in the peds outpatient clinic, which ended up being very educational. We saw another premature baby, and this one had come even earlier. At birth the baby had been 900 grams, and now it was 2 months old and was 1.8 kilos. Once again, this baby was SO small. Another girl came in with respiratory symptoms, and it turned out that her PPD reading was 28 mm. Turned out it was latent TB (chest x-ray was negative), but the doc prescribed medicine anyway because any sort of immunosuppression, from measles, for example, would send her into full blown TB disease. We got the chance to talk to the pediatrician quite a bit about children's health in India, which was really interesting.
Afterwards, we had lunch (I had a Dosa Masala, a kind of weird crepe with potatoes inside), and it was quite tasty. We then headed up to the operation theater, and we were invited to watch a trans-urethral resection of a bladder tumor. Basically, the doctor stuck a camera/cauterizer through the tip of the man's penis, up the urethra, and into the bladder. The whole thing was done on the TV screen, and it was pretty amazing to watch him work. I have to admit, though, it made me cringe every time he put that thing inside the guy's John Thomas. The thing was WIDE! That can't feel good. Nonetheless, it was an impressive procedure, and the doc was very cool about explaining what he was doing.
After that surgery, we took about a 10 minute rest for tea, and we scrubbed in for a surgery with Dr. Mehta. This one turned out to be a radical neck dissection, along with a laser hemiglossectomy for a patient with stomach and neck cancer. For all of you non-docs (read: everyone except Becca and Joel), this basically meant that Dr. Mehta removed an entire side of the patient's neck, sparing only the major nerves and vessels (vagus, phrenic, CN XI, carotid arteries), followed by using a laser to remove half of the patient's tongue. The whole procedure took about 4 hours, but it was pretty captivating to watch. He kept coming SO close to the crucial nerves/vessels, but he totally avoided them....unbelievable! Becca, that's going to be you one day, you bad ass! Anyway, it was really cool. One interesting side note was that Dr. Mehta kept encouraging us to take pictures (I guess there's no HIPAA in India), so I have a bunch of really cool surgery shots.
So, overall, today was pretty bad ass. I was really impressed by the docs, and I was also quite amazed by the technology that they are using. Isn't this supposed to be a third world country? I guess only in certain places.
Ok, so I guess I've written another LONG ass post, so I'm off to get some sleep. GO MAVS!!
Anyway, after the meditation and a tour of the hospital, we kind of just wandered around, and there wasn't much to do. I did get the chance to go into the NICU, though, and that was pretty amazing. There was a pair of twins who were born prematurely, and each one of them only weighed 1.5 kilos a piece (for those of you counting at home, that's about 3.3 pounds). They were TINY. I found out today that they were transferred to another hospital that is better equipped to take care of them, so hopefully they're ok.
I have to admit, I woke up this morning a bit discouraged, because even though I got to go to the NICU yesterday, most of the afternoon was spent wandering aimlessly. Luckily, that all changed today. I started the day in the peds outpatient clinic, which ended up being very educational. We saw another premature baby, and this one had come even earlier. At birth the baby had been 900 grams, and now it was 2 months old and was 1.8 kilos. Once again, this baby was SO small. Another girl came in with respiratory symptoms, and it turned out that her PPD reading was 28 mm. Turned out it was latent TB (chest x-ray was negative), but the doc prescribed medicine anyway because any sort of immunosuppression, from measles, for example, would send her into full blown TB disease. We got the chance to talk to the pediatrician quite a bit about children's health in India, which was really interesting.
Afterwards, we had lunch (I had a Dosa Masala, a kind of weird crepe with potatoes inside), and it was quite tasty. We then headed up to the operation theater, and we were invited to watch a trans-urethral resection of a bladder tumor. Basically, the doctor stuck a camera/cauterizer through the tip of the man's penis, up the urethra, and into the bladder. The whole thing was done on the TV screen, and it was pretty amazing to watch him work. I have to admit, though, it made me cringe every time he put that thing inside the guy's John Thomas. The thing was WIDE! That can't feel good. Nonetheless, it was an impressive procedure, and the doc was very cool about explaining what he was doing.
After that surgery, we took about a 10 minute rest for tea, and we scrubbed in for a surgery with Dr. Mehta. This one turned out to be a radical neck dissection, along with a laser hemiglossectomy for a patient with stomach and neck cancer. For all of you non-docs (read: everyone except Becca and Joel), this basically meant that Dr. Mehta removed an entire side of the patient's neck, sparing only the major nerves and vessels (vagus, phrenic, CN XI, carotid arteries), followed by using a laser to remove half of the patient's tongue. The whole procedure took about 4 hours, but it was pretty captivating to watch. He kept coming SO close to the crucial nerves/vessels, but he totally avoided them....unbelievable! Becca, that's going to be you one day, you bad ass! Anyway, it was really cool. One interesting side note was that Dr. Mehta kept encouraging us to take pictures (I guess there's no HIPAA in India), so I have a bunch of really cool surgery shots.
So, overall, today was pretty bad ass. I was really impressed by the docs, and I was also quite amazed by the technology that they are using. Isn't this supposed to be a third world country? I guess only in certain places.
Ok, so I guess I've written another LONG ass post, so I'm off to get some sleep. GO MAVS!!
posted by david.m.marcus at 10:19 AM
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