Interns presentations from Jenni and Isaac.

Below are the links to the presentations from Jenni Palo and Isaac Singh the Trainee Interns who have just completed a two week work experience at VSHC. This is followed by a short article sharing their thoughts about the experience.

Jenni - RH rights.pdf

Isaac - STEPs.pdf
 

As our time here at Viseisei Sai Health Centre draws to a close, we are left to reflect on the past two weeks that we have spent here with a sense of newfound maturity and some measures of sadness that our time here has come to an end.
In all honesty, we came to Viseisei Sai Health Centre with preconceived ideas about the experience and a negative mentality. Having just come from a subdivisional hospital setting, we were set in curative medicine and had little interest in preventative medicine and the public health aspect. Luckily for us, our attachment at VSHC has taught us the importance of health promotion and health education in our fight against the silent killer in Fiji – NCDs.
Our experience brought us to the doorstep of the very people in the community who needed to have the awareness about healthy living and how unhealthy habits were slowly and unknowingly killing them. We learnt the true meaning of ‘public’ health during our outreaches. We found that our textbook knowledge of it did not equip us adequately and only experiencing it could teach us. We became involved in many community activities such as backyard gardening, building composts and healthy cooking demonstrations. We were also fortunate enough to be part of the two-day refresher course for the Community Health Workers (CHWs) where we learnt from their experience also.
The VSHC team are composed of very passionate and gifted individuals whose main mission is to educate the public and whose enthusiasm in doing so was inspiring. In all of this, we found ourselves changing our perspective on preventative medicine and public health as a whole and realised just how important it is not only as a clinician but also as an individual. We also found ourselves becoming more health conscious, which we think is a testament to how good a job the VSHC team are doing in promoting health living.
So in essence, our experience at VSHC has been an educational one and we have been inspired to be advocates of public health in whatever capacity we can as future doctors.

Isaac Singh & Jenni Palo

Jenni (Middle), Trainee Intern, and Lauren, (R) Volunteer Nutritionist, conducting activity during nutrition education session at Viseisei Primary School


Isaac, Trainee Intern, (L) and Iliesa Namuira (R) during composting demonstration in Nabare