"For that we study medicine, to help"

The University of Azuay recently delivered the certificates to the students who successfully completed their Rotating Internship in the areas of Pediatrics, Surgery, Clinic, Gynecology - Obstetrics and Community Medicine in the teaching hospitals of the Faculty.

Having done it during a pandemic was a completely new challenge for the students.

On Campus we interviewed 23-year-old Nicole Villa, who did her internship at the José Carrasco Arteaga Hospital and we began by asking her how her experience was in this time of Covid 19.

It was a rather abrupt change, the pre-pandemic internship functioned in a totally different way and once this began, new protocols were implemented in all hospitals and biosecurity measures were increased.

At the beginning it was a shock because we had to adapt to many changes such as the new R code that is activated when patients with Covid are admitted and one, as an intern, could not pass through the areas where said patients were.

Likewise, it took us time to get used to constant disinfection, hand washing, and mask use. Above all, at the beginning our greatest fear was getting infected and putting our families at risk.

However, all of us who did the internship were always willing to continue going to the hospital, we knew that with the high demand for patients they needed us, and for that we studied medicine, to help.

Did you feel safe in your boarding school, do you feel that the University provided you with all the biosecurity measures?

Fortunately, the University did help us with gloves, masks and protective screens and as inmates we were in areas with patients without Covid, so on that side we always feel protection from the University and the hospital.

The only thing that did cost us is that sometimes patients who were not supposed to have Covid were admitted, until after a few days they began to present symptoms.

So my colleagues and I had a high level of contact with infected people. That is why, to be safe, the use of the mask and hand washing was paramount.

Do you think that having done your internship at this time prepared you better as a doctor?

Yes, because we developed other qualities, we realized that our career is not risk-free and despite that we were all willing to help.

Similarly, there were quite a few patients who could not receive visits, since admission was restricted, so the only ones who were there for them were us and that made us develop that human side a little more.

Can you tell us about an experience that has impacted you?

The case that most impacted me was that of a girl who, along with her parents, had a traffic accident, and all three were in critical condition, she even required neurosurgery. This marked me since I received her in emergencies so from the beginning I was with her.

After so much time and so much effort she left without sequelae, as if nothing had happened, and the day she was discharged she gave me a huge hug and for me that was completely satisfactory, I felt fulfilled.

As doctors, seeing how the patient enters, being there every day in direct contact with him and then leaving them grateful is what makes us the happiest, so we know we did a good job.

What do you think about our health system?

It should definitely improve. They should carry out training, especially in primary care, in this way it is possible to prevent pathologies, thus future complications can be controlled.

Similarly, the structure should change, the primary care level should be the one that diagnoses early, thus avoiding saturation of the secondary and tertiary care level that are large hospitals and we could offer a better service.

However, this does not occur in our health system, we have received cases that have been diagnosed late and there are so many that in the end the system becomes oversaturated, which reduces our ability to resolve.

Similarly, it is extremely important to improve the administration by the Ministry of Health, since we do not always have enough materials and supplies and most patients do not have the financial means to purchase their medication.

Our health system is poorly structured and is being poorly managed, before without a pandemic, our hospitals were not equipped, there were days when we did not have access to all supplies. Now with the pandemic it is worse.

UDA Correspondent