I’ve learned quite a few things about the healthcare system from social outings with the med students, residents, and attending physicians.

One such as example is when I joined Ryan, an internal medicine & pediatrics resident, in going to Club Fusion with his friend Dave, a neurologist. It almost sounds like the beginning of a joke: A med-peds resident, a neurologist, and an undergrad walk into a bar… But anyway, the highlight of the outing was my conversation with Dave about my internship and the healthcare challenges here. I mentioned the Dremofuge and explained my difficulty in finding a demand for the battery-powered, low-cost device. He commented that Botswana, being a middle-income country, had the resources needed, but lacked trained personnel; they often have new machines that never get used because no one knows how to use it or what it’s for, even. Not your regular bar talk.

At another group outing, a fancy dinner at a Portuguese restaurant, I chatted with Dagan about the challenges of the healthcare system here. He said that often, biopsies would be sent to the lab, but would never make it back to the doctors and patients, or if they do, they arrive 6 weeks later. He attributed this partially to (as previously mentioned by Alexandra and Lila) a lack of accountability in the system, as well as inefficiency in communication of the results. The other medical residents have often mentioned accountability as well.

I’ve learned quite a bit from hanging out with the med students, residents, and attending physicians. True, 80% of their conversations are about medicine, and they often use quite a bit of terminology that I need to look up in Google after I get back to my laptop. However, I’ve gained quite a bit of insight on my future career path, and gleaned quite a bit of useful information on the healthcare system here in Botswana. It also helps that the classes I’ve taken as a Biochemistry major and my experience as an EMT help me decode their conversations.