My Indang RHU Immersion Experience: Day 6 - The Short Return

Today, since there was no announced suspension of classes in Indang, we pushed through to our RHU immersion despite the stormy weather. Since I was expecting a suspension for today, I actually waited as late as possible before going to the RHU, but I didn't let that make me late since punctuality is a priority. As usual, we first-years worked the registration area of the Indang Rural Health Unit. Since we needed to survey the local population regarding their awareness and usage of complementary and alternative medicine, we made sure to offer the survey to each patient we had, especially because we realized very early on in the day that we were going to get less patients than usual because of the weather. I actually learned a bit of how to conduct these kinds of surveys, since it had been quite a while since the last time I did one of them. I surveyed 3 patients, and one of them was memorable because even though they weren't interested in complementary and alternative medicine, they were really joyful and enthusiastic in sharing their daily life between the questions. Because of this, I realized that being a doctor requires me to be interested in the actual lives of the patients, because not only does it promote camaraderie with them, but also makes them feel seen and heard, which will help with their compliance with whatever needs to be done. 
 

We were also contacted by Dr. Rodriguez, who was overseeing the different RHUs, about the guidelines that we will be following for the community health system analysis report that we will be presenting at the end of the immersion. We were also notified of the other output requirements that we needed for this immersion, which included the group written reports and individual reflection papers. Around noon, we were informed that Malacañang suspended classes, and work in government offices in Cavite. Despite this, we still finished our complete shifts. We headed home a bit sad that we will most likely have more suspensions coming this week, yet determined to work on the reports, presentations, and papers as best as we can.
Location: 6V2F+483, J. Dimabiling Street, Indang, Cavite, Philippines

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