I know it has been a while since I last wrote. Been a bit busy lately. And in my moments of downtime I’ve found myself doing a different type of writing. I’ve been writing some fiction. Mostly because it’s a bit therapeutic. Anyhow, back to Medical School related matters.
On Friday we had two guest lecturers for our two-hour session of a class called Understanding Your Patient. During the first hour, a professor spoke about understanding cultural differences among our patients. He primarily focused on the latino culture because there is a huge hispanic population in the local area. One thing he mentioned is that in general, the hispanic population would put up very little resistance when talking to a physician. But that does not give any indication that they agree with what you are saying to them.
And that is a very important thing. In this class we have discussed the idea of getting a patient to cooperate and accept the treatment plan. And this applies to everyone, not just the latino community. In order to have the best results, doctors must team up with the patient for a common goal. The idea of white-coat-wearing-doctor dishing out his wisdom on health and a patient obediently following instructions is outdated and just doesn’t work.
During the second hour he gave the time to a local Mexican woman who talked to us about various herbal and traditional remedies the Mexican people use. She told us that many times they turn to those first, because going to see a doctor is just too expensive. She also brought samples of the things she talked about.
I learned that they use a camomile and spearmint tea for a of different things. She shared remedies for many common ailments. There is one treatment, for headaches, that I plan to try. It involves soaking a pinto bean in rubbing alcohol. In the event a headache, the bean is placed on the temples. Supposedly this relieves the pain. I’m quite interested in trying it out. Cause every once in a while, when I don’t drink enough water, I get some pretty annoying headaches.
Anyways, I hope to be able to post with a little more frequency this month.
P.S.
Remember the disclaimer. I’m not offering medical advice on this site. So try that pinto bean thing at your own discretion.
