Blog Description

This past summer I went on a 6 week medical observational internship in Ghana, Africa with the Abusua Foundation (an NGO run out of Ghana). I went to gain experience in a hospital and see if medicine is really what I want to do with my life. I lived in the small village of Kwaprow, in the coastal fishing town of Cape Coast. I worked in two hospitals: Cape Coast District (smaller, less modern)and Central Regional (larger, more modern). I also taught English and Science to young children of my village at the BCL after-school program.

While there, I wrote a journal about my experiences in the hospital, teaching at the after-school program, and general life in Ghana. Since being home, some people have expressed an interest in reading the journal, so I figured the easiest thing to do was to post the journal here for anyone who is interested in reading it. Any patient names mentioned have been changed to ensure confidentiality.

It should be noted that because this is a blog site, the postings are in reverse order of when they occurred (which I can't change). So, to read the entries in order you should start from the oldest posts at the bottom of this page.

About Ghana
Ghana is a coastal country in West Africa. The national language of Ghana is English. The capital of Ghana is Accra. Ghana is considered the safest country in Africa (according to global peace index; see Global Peace Index map at the bottom). In terms of development, Ghana is ranked in the middle tier of African countries and 152 out of 182 in the world by the Human Development Index.

Monetary exchange:
$1.40 CAN = 1 Cedi, 1 Cedi = 100 Pesewas





July 19, 2010


Today was my first official day in the female ward, with Dr. Kwarteng.  Dr. Kwarteng was also the doctor for the maternity ward, so I followed him there as well.  In contrast to Dr. Kudoh, the approach Dr. Kwarteng takes with teaching us interns and the nurses is much less student-teacher and more friend-friend. 
Things at the afterschool program continued to go very well.  A few days back I had asked the kids to write a paragraph on anything they wanted, to help me gauge their writing levels, which many of them had not done.  Today, one student, Collins, brought the assignment in. His paragraph was about how he really looked forward to coming to the after school program because he liked me so much as his teacher.  I was very touched by the paragraph. 
Back at the house, dinner was rice and some sort of sauce, as per usual.  It was pretty tasty I guess, but not very satisfying, as I am getting pretty sick of rice.
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