Kindness
Everywhere we went while traveling through the country of Grenada we were met with kindness. This made us feel so loved and welcomed and brought such a positive light to this trip. A wonderful example of this kindness was our driver, Trevor. He patiently waited for us wherever we went and also imparted so much cultural knowledge to us about his country. All of the people we cared for through our stay also met us with the same kindness and openness to the health information and care that we brought with us.
Improvisation
In school we are always taught to think on our toes and that flexibility is a very important skill. During my time in Grenada, I truly gained an appreciation of this teaching because of the way that I tackled the challenges that I was faced with. An example of this was during the set-up for our second health fair, I encountered a young boy who had cut his finger open with a knife trying to open a box. All I had with me was my hand sanitizer, so I used this to sanitize his finger and then wiped it off and held pressure with some clean tissue I had in my pocket. A classmate of mine happened to walk by after I cleaned it up and offered a band-aid at just the perfect time. This type of teamwork and flexibility is something that we don't encounter much doing our clinical in the hospital, so it taught me a valuable lesson that I will not forget.
Patience
One area that I feel much improved upon after this trip is the patient interview and conversation with a patient. Having no time crunch or set schedule really allowed me the time and patience to dedicate all of my attention to my patients. During this time of undivided attention, I started to notice a pattern of how they would open up to me once they could tell they had my attention and I was opening up to them. This showed me the true importance of listening to your patients that we have been taught in school. I now know that this is the best way to help your patients get the best care possible and allow me as a nurse to advocate for them.
