After managing to stay awake until 8pm, Fiona and I managed to sleep the entire night. The three of us woke around 6am, feeling much more rested. We counted down the minutes until 7:30, when breakfast started, then hurried downstairs.
The internet, to our horror, wasn't working upstairs so we eagerly caught up on emails and the outside world during breakfast. The whole team was assembled by 9am, including Lillian, a student from the school of public health doing research in Hyderabad for six months and Akhila's younger sister.
The neonatal team squeezed into a small car (the driver kindly assured us that seat belts were not necessary) and we were off to our first hospital for the day, a government neonatal and pediatric hospital (picture below).
Our time in this facility was incredible. We ran around between all of the different wards they had. Not only did they have a level three NICU but they also had multiple other lower level NICU rooms, a resuscitation room, a bilirubin room, and a room for very low birth weight/premature infants.
I spent most of my time taking pictures of fans and air conditioning units and their educational posters on the wall and trying to slyly measure the temperature in each room. The goal was to understand what was the environment that these babies were in.
We were able to spend time sitting down with a group of pediatricians/neonatologists and medical students and were able to get a lot of feedback on our device. By then it was 12:45 and we were rushed off to the local medical college because we had a meeting with the principle there.
After meeting with the principle and a couple other doctors and eating an assortment of cookies and bananas, we were brought to a large auditorium. The school's medical students filed in and we presented to them for the next couple of hours.
Around 4:30 or so we left the medical college and traversed some pretty busy roads (I might have actually held onto Akhila the entire time). We tried to get some phones, unsuccessfully, and went to the most famous chaat place in town. Chaat (its taken multiple visits to India and Nepal to understand this concept) literally means a small snack, and there are lots of different options. If I understand correctly, which I probably don't, samosas would be considered chaat.
We took our chaat and ate it in the van, literally feeding one another. I had just realized I had lost my water bottle (my favorite Johns Hopkins BME water bottle NBD or anything) and put on a very brave face.
We then drove to Lotus Hospital, a private hospital that caters just to pediatrics. This facility was pretty stunning. First of all, the waiting room was Madagascar themed. Solid choice. We sat in little children chairs and waited. This made some of the Indian families take pictures of us. We then toured their facilities for the next couple of hours. It ended with us giving some presentations and then them serving us a large banquet dinner (very spicy but very delicious). They told us they had decreased the spice level for us. We couldn't tell.
Another important fact about this facility: each of their patient rooms had themes. These themes included Spiderman and Shrek.
We left the facility around 10pm and got back around 10:30. Its almost midnight (whoops) but apparently tomorrow is our day off. Yoga and massages? Don't mind if I do.....
The internet, to our horror, wasn't working upstairs so we eagerly caught up on emails and the outside world during breakfast. The whole team was assembled by 9am, including Lillian, a student from the school of public health doing research in Hyderabad for six months and Akhila's younger sister.
The neonatal team squeezed into a small car (the driver kindly assured us that seat belts were not necessary) and we were off to our first hospital for the day, a government neonatal and pediatric hospital (picture below).
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| Babies receiving phototherapy treatment in one of the "NICUs" |
I spent most of my time taking pictures of fans and air conditioning units and their educational posters on the wall and trying to slyly measure the temperature in each room. The goal was to understand what was the environment that these babies were in.
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| How dost one rag? |
After meeting with the principle and a couple other doctors and eating an assortment of cookies and bananas, we were brought to a large auditorium. The school's medical students filed in and we presented to them for the next couple of hours.
Around 4:30 or so we left the medical college and traversed some pretty busy roads (I might have actually held onto Akhila the entire time). We tried to get some phones, unsuccessfully, and went to the most famous chaat place in town. Chaat (its taken multiple visits to India and Nepal to understand this concept) literally means a small snack, and there are lots of different options. If I understand correctly, which I probably don't, samosas would be considered chaat.
We took our chaat and ate it in the van, literally feeding one another. I had just realized I had lost my water bottle (my favorite Johns Hopkins BME water bottle NBD or anything) and put on a very brave face.
We then drove to Lotus Hospital, a private hospital that caters just to pediatrics. This facility was pretty stunning. First of all, the waiting room was Madagascar themed. Solid choice. We sat in little children chairs and waited. This made some of the Indian families take pictures of us. We then toured their facilities for the next couple of hours. It ended with us giving some presentations and then them serving us a large banquet dinner (very spicy but very delicious). They told us they had decreased the spice level for us. We couldn't tell.
Another important fact about this facility: each of their patient rooms had themes. These themes included Spiderman and Shrek.
We left the facility around 10pm and got back around 10:30. Its almost midnight (whoops) but apparently tomorrow is our day off. Yoga and massages? Don't mind if I do.....
Per Wikipedia, ragging is a form of extreme and often violent hazing common in the Indian school system, and is now illegal. It is a legacy of the British school system during the colonial period. It can result in death, suicide or lifelong trauma. Hopefully you do not encounter it.
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