Medical Brigade 2009

Last week or so an amazing group of korean american doctors and volunteers came to palmar and offered their services for five days. I was lucky enough to be able to help their efforts by translating. I was also really lucky in that the same dentist from last years medical brigade returned and we got to work together again. I really love to work with him because he really cares about the people and doesn´t lose his cool when kids scream bloody murder ( which they do.)

Actually everyone involved in the medical brigade is pretty amazing . This year we spent three days in palmar and two days working in some more needy communities. Medical translating is one of my favorite things to do. It´s the next best thing to being the doctor because you really get to help someone. One of the medical services this medical brigade offers is acupuncture. I got really bad food poisoning and so the doctors offered me acupuncture. So i thought- sure, why not? So I did acupuncture which was a really cool experience. I really hate needles but you almost don´t feel them and i really believe that without acupuncture i would not have been able to continue working. I actually ended up doing acupuncture twice.

We set up the dentist office outside one day and worked around dogs, turkeys, a bee hive and chickens. i don´t have the exact stats but my guess is we served about 250 people (dentistry alone) altogether my guess is 1,000 or so. It was a tough week but so worth it.