First week at Kalinga Eye Hospital and Research Centre in Orissa, India (Unite For Sight)

Namaskar! After 51 hours of traveling due to a series of delayed flights, I was so happy to finally arrive at my internship site for the summer, Kalinga Eye Hospital and Research Centre (KEHRC) in Orissa, India. I obtained this internship by becoming a Global Impact Fellow of a non-profit organization called Unite For Sight. One of my main reasons for applying was that a former Social Justice WOW recipient and Unite For Sight Global Impact Fellow, Samuel Icaza, told me about it.  He informed me about Unite For Sight programs and how the effort you put in to provide accessible medical services to people in need has a long-lasting impact on the community. At that time, I was going to Costa Rica and Nicaragua on a medical volunteer trip for 10 days that sought to provide basic physician services through free clinics and our donated supply of over-the-counter drugs while traveling to different villages. While the experience taught me invaluable lessons and gave me unforgettable memories, I realized that my efforts were not spent on working with the local infrastructure of the health care system to make sustainable changes in its access to health.

After being inspired by what I observed, I applied to Unite For Sight because instead of short-term relief mission trips, the organization collaborates with local eye clinics to provide outreach camps to villages without eye care facility, screen patients and provide corrective refractive glasses, and bring patients back to the hospital for cataract and other eye surgeries, free-of-charge. These surgeries are sponsored and paid for by Unite For Sight.  I helped contribute by fund-raising $1,800 prior to my internship so that 100% of the donations can be made to restore people’s eye sight without the barrier of high operation cost. Lastly, the average cost of cataract surgery through Unite For Sight is $50, which is incredible in that the price we pay for a pair of jeans in the US can help someone to regain eye sight and be able to connect with their family, friends, and the world.

I specifically chose Kalinga Eye Hospital and Research Centre among different Unite For Sight sites because this facility offers pediatric care and even has initiated a training for pediatric eye surgeons. At this hospital, as a volunteer and intern, I shadow ophthalmologists in the morning for about 4-5 hours, shadow and learn about basic visual acuity tests by engaging with optometrists, and work on hospital marketing and management projects of my choice. During outreach camps, I travel by bus for 4 hours to arrive at a remote village where I help contribute in the screening process (such as distributing eye glasses), help bring patients back to the hospital, and observe all cataract surgeries for non-paying patients (most from outreach camps). This is a protocol specified by Unite For Sight, as the organization needs to logistically track all the sponsored eye surgeries.

Currently, the hospital founder and president is abroad for conferences, but will soon return to Kalinga Eye Hospital. Based on my observations and ideas, I am currently working on a presentation to recommend some changes made to hospital marketing strategies and pediatric services here, as well as conducting a patient satisfaction survey for both non-paying and paying patients. I will also soon be writing letters to insurance companies to ask them to collaborate with the hospital, as KEHRC has not yet implemented a system where it accepts insurance plans (to facilitate patients’ hospital experience and also promote higher quality medical services).  Lastly, I will be finding a local baby to become a model for the hospital and design posters to improve the hospital’s image. Having run for the Student Union for 2 years, I have learned to enjoy the poster designing process and creating memorable slogans.

Finally, I will be recording a video about the patient’s perspective of Kalinga Eye Hospital, so that upon completing my hospital experience, I can edit the raw footage to best capture the essence of what KEHRC does and how Unite For Sight is involved.

I have learned so much already by talking to ophthalmologists.  Today I learned how to use the bio-microscopy machine (the eye machine in ophthalmologist’s office) and saw multiple layers of the eye through the instrument! Another interesting fact here is that many patients refuse to accept the concept of ‘no cure’ because the body will naturally heal itself, such as in cases of trauma. So often , doctors provide eye drops that do not directly ‘heal’ the symptoms but that serve as a psychological aid to patients’ worried minds (as they believe they will not heal without a medical ‘aid’).

If anyone is interested in knowing more about the Kalinga Eye Hospital, please visit the hospital website. Also, if anyone wants to learn more about Unite For Sight, please visit the organization’s website.

That is it for now, I am excited to update you more about my internship! Please leave any comment or questions if you’d like. Thanks for reading!

-Gloria Park, 2013

 

First Week at AVODAH

AVODAH is a Jewish Service Corps that engages participants in service by placing them with anti-poverty nonprofit organizations. They also focus on group-building skills since corps members live together. I gained so much more insight on the incredible accomplishments of the organization when I arrived at the office in New York City. Its mission puts great emphasis on the importance of continuing to create social change throughout one’s life even after their year of service. I am working as the program intern, and am predominantly responsible for improving the alumni program. This involves reaching out to alumni that have lost touch with the organization, working on the monthly newsletter and the alumni resource website, sending out important messages to alumni, and completing other important paper work. I found out about this summer opportunity through a Hiatt Career Center information session on my floor. I applied for the internship on B.hired over winter break and was contacted for a phone interview. After two sets of interviews the woman I now work under emailed and congratulated me on receiving the internship.

My first week at AVODAH was both an exciting and unique experience. My first day at the Jewish Service Corps was hectic since the organization was holding their biggest fundraising event the next day.  I was immediately put to work, stuffing bags and name tags, and was scheduled to help run the registration table at the event. Although this was nerve-racking since I would be one of the first people to greet the attendees, I knew it was a wonderful opportunity to meet others who held similar values for social justice and social change. I was working throughout the whole event but enjoyed it as much as everyone else.  The genuine passion everyone held for AVODAH was inspiring and I was so grateful to be a part of the event.

In just two days I felt a part of the staff at AVODAH. They were very welcoming and thought of me as a valuable helper. The next day, after doing some post-event work, I sat down with the woman I was going to be working with for the rest of the summer. We had a two and a half hour conversation of the goals for the alumni program. Feeling even more informed about the service corps, I began working on the alumni program. I expect to learn much more from this summer internship. It has only been the first week and I feel as though I have gained a great deal of knowledge about how service corps works and the importance of maintaining a strong alumni network.

– Danielle Mizrachi ’13

No Equity without Solidarity

“I’m glad you made it on time, Sarah!”

“Absolutely! I am really excited to be here.”

I had been nervously waiting with ice coffee in hand at the non-profit Partners in Health (PIH) lobby for a few minutes, waiting for my site-supervisor to walk through the front door of the main office entrance. While I had read much about PIH in books, watched videos online, and discussed the organization’s global impact with friends, I had never quite made it past the lobby of their central Boston office. I knew that once I saw my site-supervisor cross the threshold of the office entrance, I would begin engaging with the domestic epicenter of this vastly global organization.

“Fantastic that you made your way up here. But we’re actually about to head right out. I have a bit of a wild goose chase for us…”

May 24^th was my first full day working with PIH, but I ended up spending no more than twenty minutes beyond the lobby of the non-profit I had long looked up to. While I had anticipated my first day to be limited to small steps like acclimating to my desk area, a lot of handshakes, and a swirling array of new faces and names to learn, my first day ended up being a more proper introduction to PIH and my summer internship.

PIH is a health-oriented non-profit that is based in Boston but delivers its impact to 13 countries; Haiti, Lesotho, Malawi, Mexico, Peru, Russia, Rwanda, Kazakhstan, Burundi, Guatemala, Liberia, Mali, Nepal, and domestically within the Boston-metro area. An organization that operates with a mission that is both medical and moral, the PIH approach is one based in solidarity rather than charity alone. Founded in 1987 by Dr. Paul Farmer, Ophelia Dahl, and Dr. Jin Yong Kim, the non-profit entity was a logical second step from Dr. Farmer’s extraordinary healthcare projects in rural Haiti.

Children in rural Malawi make PIH’s primary logo with their hands. 

“We’re heading out to IBM’s headquarters for the day,” my site-supervisor tells me while we wait for the T to come to a full stop. “They’re hosting a Volunteer Festival for the employees, you know, so they can learn more about different opportunities that they can be a part of in the Boston area. PIH hosts volunteer nights once a month that IBM can help out with.” The train doors open as Boston University students and non-profit workers pour from all of the doors. “So Sarah,” my supervisor turns to me as we push our way onto the train, “how would you explain PIH to someone?”

A lot of people have learned about Dr. Farmer and PIH through a book called Mountains Beyond Mountains. It is an up-close biography following Dr. Farmer through many years and many countries; the author, Tracy Kidder, justifies the subheading of his book as “The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, A Man Who Would Cure the World.” Kidder’s book was my first introduction to PIH as well, though it was not my first taste of the growing field of global health. Since high school, I had been passionate about healthcare access in marginalized communities, particularly women’s healthcare. I had decided upon entering Brandeis that my education and future career goals would be oriented towards empowering my global community to seek and achieve a better form of healthcare. And, when I read the snippets of Dr. Farmer’s life characterized in Mountains Beyond Mountains, I felt solidarity in his dedication as he climbed the steep and rocky foothills of rural Haiti to reach remote patients that sought healthcare.

The picture above shows Dr. Farmer with a young patient in Haiti. While PIH’s work spans thirteen countries, the largest efforts have been based in Haiti. 

In February, I organized a panel for ‘DEISImpact!; a week-long celebration of social justice at Brandeis, both on and off campus. My panel was called “Idealism and the Undergrad: Student Involvement and its Effectiveness on Global Health Initiatives.” I gathered an American student studying global development and a Burmese student who was both a doctor and public health specialist in her home country, both of whom study at the Heller School for Social Policy and Management, Dr. Tschampl, the Health, Science, Society, Policy (HSSP) Internship Instructor and the Boston Global Group Leader for RESULTS, and my site-supervisor, the Community Engagement Coordinator at PIH. My goal in hosting this panel was to address my question of possible value and harm that could come from hopeful and idealistic undergraduates engaging with international clinics. How can undergraduates be a part of a sustainable healthcare movement without adequate training, experience, or education? Through ongoing dialogue after this panel with my site-supervisor, I was able to secure my current internship at PIH.

I am currently collaborating with several PIH employees and volunteers to create a project which will increase domestic knowledge about PIH. While the program has yet to launch, my role is to design various components of this program as it will be piloted to numerous communities in the United States.

“Partners in Health? So what do you guys do?”

Not many of the IBM workers at the Volunteer Festival had heard of PIH. But as more people came to our table, my site-supervisor and I shared stories of the wonderful work that PIH does with each of them. Not all of them signed up for a volunteer shift, but more than a few did. I think a lot of the reason why so many people signed up for the PIH volunteer night was not because the volunteer work particularly struck them. Rather, it was the idea that they would be joining a movement that tackling a Goliath issue — providing sustainable and equitable healthcare to impoverished communities around the world — an immense problem at which Dr. Farmer and his many supporters chip away day by day.

I am not the only person to have been moved after reading Mountains Beyond Mountains or heard people talk about PIH. Far from it. The office is filled with many young and brilliant workers working on a range of projects under the umbrella that is PIH. It’s this impactful and visible work that drive so many students, doctors, and local community members want to become a part of PIH. This summer, I hope to learn what my role, both as an undergraduate and as a hopeful doctor a few years down the line, could be in such a great movement.

 “No data in the world, no good vaccine, no potent medicine will get to the poorest of the poor without you. There will be no equity without solidarity. There will be no justice without a social movement.”

Dr. Joia Mukherjee, Chief Medical Officer, Partners in Health

 

 A village healthcare worker takes notes on a patient in rural Haiti. 

 

For more on Partners in Health and Paul Farmer, see below:

“The Good Doctor,” an article profiling Dr. Farmer by Tracy Kidder (author of “Mountains Beyond Mountains”)

“Realigning Health with Care,” an article co-authored by Dr. Farmer.

“Mountains Beyond Mountains,” the detailed biography on Dr. Farmer and PIH by Tracy Kidder.

– Sarah Van Buren ’13

 

First Week at the Conflict Kitchen

This past week, I started my internship at the Conflict Kitchen in Pittsburgh, PA. Founded in 2010, it is a take-out restaurant that features countries with which the United States is in conflict, serving food and hosting cultural and education events. They seek to encourage dialogue and learning in order to move past the unhealthy and polarizing discourse surrounding these countries in the United States. While working for the Conflict Kitchen, I will be doing mostly research for their upcoming iterations and event-planning. I will also be working at the take-out window, where the majority of the dialogue and education takes place.

The Conflict Kitchen Windowfront

As a native of Pittsburgh, I discovered the Conflict Kitchen two summers ago. Its mission deeply resonated with me. Being truly passionate about dialogue and dispelling prejudices through the arts and finding myself ready to more professionally explore the facilitation of cultural learning, I contacted the directors with the possibility of an internship. After an interview and a discussion of our mutual goals, they offered me a position of mainly research and event-planning.

To begin my training and get acquainted with the daily work of the project, I worked in the kitchen this week. Based on the recent news surrounding the United States and Iran, the Conflict Kitchen switched to their Iranian menu. I learned how to make the Iranian food and stepped into the window a few times to interact with the customers. People come to the Conflict Kitchen with varying levels of knowledge and opinions of Iran, its culture and its relationship with the United States. It is fascinating to see their reactions to the food as well as to the interviews with Iranians featured on the wrapper in which the food is served. The most interesting encounters are with those customers who have simply stumbled on the Conflict Kitchen and know nothing of its mission but are open to it. This is when most of the education and tearing down walls takes place. This week, the Conflict Kitchen also hosted an event with the World Affairs Council of Pittsburgh. Dr. Trita Parsi, Founder and President of the National Iranian American Council and author of A Single Roll of the Dice: Obama’s Diplomacy with Iran, came to speak about his book and the US’ diplomatic relationship with Iran. It was a truly fascinating talk and conversation stemming from the audience’s questions. This was certainly a highlight of the week, building an excitement to be a part of this process at the Conflict Kitchen.

Iranian Food Wrappers

Looking towards the rest of the summer, I look forward to learning how to facilitate cultural learning specifically in order to dispel prejudices. This will be achieved through engaging dialogue and challenging events. I will also be able to develop further research skills as I help them prepare for upcoming iterations with interviews and conversation with Cuban and Korean communities in the Pittsburgh area. I look forward to all that I will learn about peace-building through the arts and culture working with the Conflict Kitchen.

– Grace Killian ’13