Friday, July 6, 2012

Score 1 for Internal Medicine.

Those who follow this blog already know that we recently returned from a meaningful/purposeful vacation in Peru.  I am an Internist and my wife is an ophthalmologist and we were precepting students on a medical mission in the Sacred Valley in the Andes.  Our middle school daughter was our Medical Spanish translator.

She would split her time helping in both areas, Ophthalmology and Internal Medicine.  She got a kick out of helping patients get prescription glasses and the thrill of helping some kids see clearly for the first time.  After a couple of days, she got very comfortable with this and was able to independently get 20 patients a day to 20/20.

When helping in the Internal Medicine area, she learned the importance of history taking and the conversation in diagnosis and patient care.  She got a good exposure to this as she was the one translating the questions to the patient and translating the answers back to me.  After a couple days she told me, "This is so cool!  Its like solving a mystery by talking to people.  I love it! You guys are Low Tech, but High Talk!

There is hope for Internal Medicine yet!  

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