This will be my first mission trip to Nigeria, and I'm working with the VOOM foundation to care for adult patients in the intensive care unit who have undergone cardiac surgery. I've worked for years as a Physician Assistant in the cardiac surgery division at Columbia medical center and hope to bring my skills of critical care to these patients abroad. There are times when I take for granted the ability of our whole team to manage these high acuity patients; it really takes a whole family to manage just one patient. From nurses, to physical therapists, and respiratory therapists; I am merely a puzzle piece in that team. I plan to bring my depth of knowledge as a critical care provider to lead some of these team members in the ICU to progress these patients to hopefully go home! I am aware of the blessing it is for these patients to undergo these procedures, how far they must travel, how much money they must save to come to this facility. I will do everything in my power to get them back home in a healthier state!
I will be directly serving the patients in Nigeria who will be greatly impacted by our care, but I also hope to indirectly care for them by passing on my fund of knowledge to the local healthcare workers. Taking care of patients is one aspect of the project but additionally educating the staff who are local to the region is something to not be forgotten. It's simply explained in the quote, "Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime." I hope these impacts are far reaching beyond the time I spend in Nigeria.
Going on a medical mission has been a goal of mine ever since I have become a PA. Since then, I’ve learned the difference between a career and a passion. I’ve seen how caring for people in my own country creates a connection – to my patients, my coworkers, and the mission at large. When you see the impact you create by “just doing your job,” you recognize how it isn’t just that. You care for individuals and their families at the most vulnerable times in their lives and get to shape how they experience that. I am blessed to have the opportunity to take that abroad to a community that needs it more than any of us could imagine. I truly enjoy teaching at my facility, so I hope to educate the fellow local medical providers and nurses regarding our practices in hopes that they can carry on our standard of care even once we leave.
Going to the village of Oraifite in Nigeria was an eye opening experience. Here our team performed life saving cardiac operations and managed these patients postop to facilitate their transition back home. When I first signed up for this trip, I expected to be taking care of a patient population similar to the one I care for at home. What I did not realize is that the accessibility to health care spanned to simple antibiotics. This meant that rheumatic heart disease was much more prevalent in Nigeria than it is now in the United States. I found myself caring for young adults who were mainly ages 17-35, which shocked me. How different their lives were from mine simply because I have access to antibiotics to treat strep throat. During my time here I met many families - parents, wives, brothers - all who were just as grateful for the care we were providing as the patients were. Every single day I received a hug, a thank you, a blessing from these patients which demonstrated the profound impact we were having in their lives. Not only that but there was a large impact on the fellow medical colleagues we were teaching when we were in Nigeria. I realized how vital our knowledge was to pass on to these individuals who would be staying behind to provide care for these patients once we left the country. In the final days of being in Nigeria, I received countless "thank yous" from the nurses and physicians who I taught while on this trip. It was so rewarding to know that you were not only impacting the patients that you were taking care of but also their family members and the nurses and physicians of Nigeria as well. It was a profound experience that I will never forget and truly hope to experience again in the future. Thank you so much to Doximity for providing me the resources to travel far from my home to do my job for the people who not only need it but who are so grateful to have me there. Words cannot describe how deeply grateful I am!
