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| Work & Travel |
| Medicine |
If you happen to take up medicine projects during your gap year abroad, it will prove to be an invaluable asset in you career in medicine. You will witness the stark contrast between Western medical practice and the ground realities in developing countries.
Your are also likely to see medical conditions which remain untreated and have developed to an advanced pathological stage which is hard to come by in developed countries
In various countries placements are available for students taking up, or planning to take, specialized medical courses such as biomedical science, nursing and physiotherapy. Each placement customized to a volunteer's level of relevant experience and interests, and to a preferred size and category of hospital/clinic.
The main qualities looked for in a medical volunteer /gapper are unlimited enthusiasm, initiative and willingness to work in unfamiliar circumstances, e,g surgery with minimal equipment, understaffed hospitals, a clinic for leprosy or tuberculosis patients.
If you have completed your Pre-Medical course you will be involved in the day-to-day running of hospitals and clinics, observing and /or directly assisting doctors and nurses. You might watch a caesarean in the operating theater, or working with a doctor on his rounds in a big urban hospital..
As a medical student you will get the option to specialize in anesthesia, dermatology, E.N.T, hematology, microbiology, neurology, obstetrics, orthopedics and many more…
Your duties will enable you to broaden your medical experience in the context of medicinal system in a developing country.
In India, China and Sri Lanka, there exist unlimited opportunities for those who are interested in the practice of traditional medicine. Many communities in such developing countries rely on treatments derived from medicinal plants.
In modern times, some cures and preventions (using locally available natural products) which have proved efficacious for thousands of years, is valued by those who live in the drug-dependent west. So you can easily choose to combine traditional and western practices during your gap year program, thereby creating for yourself an all-round medical experience. For instance learn acupuncture or acupressure in China or Mongolia.
By working nursing & midwifery programs, you can contribute your services to hospitals, clinics and even in people's homes. Where hospitals and clinics are understaffed, you could assist with duties such as bandaging, taking blood pressure, and generally caring for the patients. If you're trained/ training or planning to train as a Midwife, you could work in a maternity clinic in India.
Rehabilitation is vitally important to help disabled children and adults to lead as normal lives as possible. Whether you have experience or not, working with physiotherapists in polio or leprosy clinics in India, or a center for disabled children in Nepal, physiotherapy departments of large hospitals in Ghana or a unit treating burn cases in Bolivia, you will learn a lot about physiotherapy being carried on in completely different cultural settings. |
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