Starting off this week’s post with the leisure activities for a change: on Saturday, Rei, Alex, and I went to visit a local animal sanctuary full of rescues that is only a 2 minute drive away from our Apartotel. We saw many different species of rescues and learned that most of them live longer than humans. All the guides, staff, and volunteer at the facility were very knowledgeable about each specie’s background, preferences, and goals. For a country that encompasses 6% of the world’s biodiversity, it is great to see small businesses like these trying to maintain normalcy for the animals, even if they were once a pet that is now abandoned.
On Sunday, we continued on our museum trek and visited the Costa Rica National Museum and the Costa Rican Arts Museum. We have now visited four of the most well known museums in Costa Rica and learned a lot about the country’s history. In the evening, Alex and I also went to see the “Costa Rica Broadway” at the Costa Rica National Theater. The weather was abysmal and both of our shoes were soaking wet by the time we arrived at the theater. However, the show made it very worth it. Surprisingly, I understood a lot of the dialogues in the Little Women (hopefully this means my Spanish must be improving!) and absolutely adored the interior design of the theater. It seems like each show is only on for a month, so I will definitely be back to see another show before I leave!
For our clinical immersion at Hospital de Niños, we began organizing our observations thus far into a master spreadsheet and started mass researching the disease state associated to each observation, current and emerging solutions for each, and relevant market analysis. Last Friday, we each presented our top 3 observations/identified needs that we would like to pursue a project in for feedback. Having completed more extensive research on the disease state, I now find it easier to understand the concerns and questions of patient guardians, the clinical manifestations of visiting patients, and potential areas where solutions could be implemented. This coming week we will be shadowing Dr. Bogantes in a slightly different clinical environment, where we will primarily be seeing inpatient consultations. I am looking forward to conducting further observations, now that we have plenty of practice, and coming up with more potential needs.