Whoever said “you can’t teach an old dog new tricks”, had never met the travelers from Brown, VCU, and Wingate Universities. Two weeks ago, Shoulder to Shoulder did something that we had never done before – we merged travelers from THREE universities in order to create ONE brigade group.
The Supervising MDs from VCU (Tommy Ball and Lauren Gorden) and their 2 Residents (Daniel Mendez and Sumni Yang) needed more travelers.
A Resident, Psychiatrist, and volunteer from Brown (Angelina Palombo, Horacio Hojman, and David Weign) needed a group to join.
A Pharmacist and pharmacy students from Wingate (Lisa Brennan, Kalyn Meosky, and Kelly Mansfield) needed to fill prescriptions for providers.
The group of 10 agreed to spend 3 days at Brown’s clinic site (Guachipilincito) and 3 days at VCU’s clinic site (Pinares).
What was the outcome? A wonderful merging of personalities, abilities, and styles and the provision of medical, psychiatric, educational and pharmaceutical services to hundreds of patients!!
The communities of Guachipilincito, Concepcion, and Pinares all benefited by these 10 strangers coming together to provide services. They saw patients in clinics, in elementary and high schools, and during home visits. In Guachi, they attended 165 people; in Pinares, they attended 160 people. The smiles on the travelers’ faces are proof that the strangers became friends. How beautiful is that!
