We started our day saddened to leave the beautiful country of Belize, but ready to return back to our loved ones! At 10 o’clock this morning we started our journey back to the United States. We jumped from San Pedro to Belize City on Tropic Air and then from Belize City to Dallas later that evening. After a full day of traveling, we are happy to report that we are all back on US soil!

WE WILL SURE MISS THESE VIEWS

OUR PILE OF BAGS FOR ALMOST THE LAST TIME

Though we were all elated to have hot running water and flushable toilets again, we were able to reflect on the living conditions of the citizens of Belize and appreciate the contrast between the two countries. Before this trip, simple things like drinkable tap water and air conditioning were expected wherever we stayed in the US. As we have stated previously in our blog posts, we now know these are privileges in which a lot of our country do not receive. We also have never been more grateful for a good slice of pizza and some breadsticks. It did not take long for all of the pizza to be gone and once we finished we got to have our Albendazole for dessert. (This is the pill we gave almost all of our patients to treat their worms… I guess it is only fair we experience it as well)

YUMMMMMMM ALBENDAZOLE

Before we indulged in our supper we went around and shared our favorite and least favorite parts of our trip. There were a lot of themes in both of the categories. It seemed a lot of the groups favorite part was seeing all the grateful people we got to serve over our four clinical days. However, with that there were also some sad feelings regarding the instances when patients came in with conditions we were not equipped to help with. Another struggle we reflected upon was how easily instructions and questions can be lost in translation. These misunderstandings can be potentially harmful when it comes to treating medical conditions. We are feeling forever grateful for our growths as a group and as individuals throughout this trip!

Tomorrow we finally depart for our final destination of Fargo, ND at around 8:30AM!! Thanks for the continued support as we finish our journey home!

Mariah and Maddy

Today was our last day at the clinics in Belize! The villages we visited today were Blue Creek, San Benito Poite, Aguacate, and Crique Jute. We have many mixed emotions about this being our last day. We were touched by so many of the patients we saw and we will miss seeing their smiling, appreciative faces. We will also miss the fellow physicians, support staff, medical students, and nurses from Project Belize who supported and taught us along the way.

Spreading knowledge to the health workers of one of the villages regarding medications

Some big takeaways from our visit after listening to the leaders speak at our banquet tonight is the little things we do can make just as big of an impact as the medical supplies we provide. Something as simple as “sun shades” can make a huge impact on the lives of the people here. We also appreciated when we had down time during our clinics because it allowed us to really interact with the people and learn even more about them. We are also beginning to realize that Belize has given just as much to us as we have brought to them. I think we all agree that our future practices will be changed because of this experience.

We love “sun shades”

Another awesome part of this trip was being able to work with Dr. Tom, our dentist, at some of the clinical sites. We realized the dental care provided here is much different then what is provided back home. When a tooth is infected or decaying in the states they do everything they can to save the tooth. Here, if the tooth is slightly infected it is pulled by the dentist because there is not a clinic close enough to treat the infection if it spreads or worsens. For this reason, extracting the tooth is more reasonable for the overall health of each individual. (Even some of our fellow nursing students got to help pull some teeth… I think they will stick to nursing)

Andrew pulling a tooth

As we move on to the more cultural aspects of our trip it is really nice to be able to turn back to our clinical experiences and realize how much we have grown in our prospectives of ourselves and others. With every clinical day we completed it further sank in just how fortunate we are to have the health care we do back home. Illnesses like chicken pox, fungal infections and cuts/sores are almost seen as a “simple” fix back home, but this experience made us realize if we don’t treat and pay attention to these things they can become a real problem. We are truly grateful for everything we have learned so far and are very excited to continue to grow in our prospectives of the Guatemalan and Belizean cultures.

The chicken pox can’t keep her down.. all smiles here in Belize 🙂

-Mariah and Andrew

Today was our first full day in Belize! After waking up at 6 A.M and driving 40 minutes on the rough Belizean roads we made it to the Laugh Out Loud Children’s Home (L.O.L). We were greeted by many smiling children waving and giggling as they watched us start our tour. After our tour we began the health assessment process for all of the children and staff at L.O.L. The process started with height and weight, then a hearing test, vitals, vision test and a head to toe assessment. After being signed off by one of the nurse practitioners, children were sent to be dewormed (we think they would say it was all worth it after the prize at the end). We were also able to provide the orphanage with supplies like clothing, a scale, medications, flip flops, toys such as frisbees, and more. Once every child had been assessed, we then assessed and treated the staff members working at the orphanage. The staff were very appreciative of our time spent with them because all the children are required to be assessed once a year by the Belize government in order to remain open and continue providing homes for children. Without groups such as ours this process of receiving assessments through a Belize clinical could take up to a week for all 37 children due to the five hour drive each way to Belize City. Instead of this week endeavor we were able to assess all 37 children and all the staff in about 4 hours.

Following our visit to the orphanage, we ate lunch at Grace’s restaurant and headed out to Rio Blanco for swimming and cliff jumping. We haven’t quite adjusted to the heat and humidity here in Belize, so we were all very happy to cool down in the water after our day at the clinic. We are all very excited to explore more of Belize tomorrow in the wet and dry caves. More updates to come!

Here are some pictures from our fun filled day 😊

-Mariah, Madi, Holly and Andrew