Today, May 13th, we had a presentation from 2 BSOL GP educators and 2 GP nurses. It was such an informational day, and everyone who spoke was very engaging with us as a group. I learned that general practice care in the UK ranges from infants to elderly, whereas in the US neonatal, pediatric, adult, and geriatric care are all separate practices. The BSOL educators come from a training hub that is dedicated to training the NHS primary workforce of the future. We learned that GP offices are not owned by the NHS but instead the doctors/owners of the GP practice. That means that GP nurses do not get the same benefits as NHS nurses. For example, they have to negotiate their wages and do not get the same 12 month maternity leave.
Primary care in the UK is called the “front door” of the NHS by seeing patients before disease sets in, and preventing the amount of people who require NHS hospital services. It was so interesting to compare our health care systems with these nurses. In the UK, we learned that children in school, people over 65 years old, and those with chronic diseases like diabetes or thyroid disease, get free prescriptions. However, middle-class healthy people have to pay about 9 pounds for every prescription/service which is similar to the US as hospital bills begin to add up. For long-term issues that don’t fall under the covered chronic disease populations, prescriptions can be paid for in advance by a fee where the patient can then get any medication during that time. It’s also interesting that most of the “free” care for diabetes is directed toward those with type 2 which is lifestyle based, and not so much type 1 which is when someone is born with a pancreas that doesn’t work properly. I also find it interesting that in the US people with a disease like diabetes can get free prescriptions, but someone with asthma, which is also deadly, do not. People with asthma need to use an inhaler and that can add up to become quite expensive, so I’m curious as to who decides which illnesses get free prescriptions and why do some populations not? From the nurses that spoke to us today, it seemed like there wasn’t a clear answer. The NHS states the populations that will get free prescriptions/aid, and the nurses just have to abide by this.
Next, we had some free time to practice our presentations where we rehearsed as a group and made final revisions. At 4:30 we then each presented our research to students and faculty at BCU. I was very nervous, but the faculty told us that we did an amazing job and did not look nervous at all! It was very validating to hear BCU professors praise our hard work, and it is such a relief to have this assignment completed. I also liked that each group had an open conversation with the faculty, so it was very fun to have academic conversations with professors and students.
This is my amazing research group before our presentation. I loved working with these girls!
Of course we had to get a silly picture.
We ended the night with Indian food from the delicious restaurant, The Indian Streetery. It did in fact start raining, and I did in fact slip and fall on the walk to dinner. The brick road was slippery and my shoes had bad traction! But I still arrived to dinner somewhat on time, and only a little bit wet from the rain! At the restaurant, the staff were so nice and helpful when it came to navigating the menu to find things that we would like. We had an assortment of appetizers that were delicious, and for my main dish I had lamb curry with mint. I have never had lamb or curry before and it was so good! I would absolutely eat this dinner again which is surprising because I was a little nervous beforehand that I would not enjoy the food.
This is the group at dinner!
Also, today I saw a snail for the first time in real life! We were walking back from the university after presenting, and out of the corner of my eye I saw these globs on the brick wall. I took a second to look and saw so many snails! It was at this moment that I realized I have never actually seen a snail in real life. We thought maybe snails in England are similar to earth worms in the US, so when it rains they come out and enjoy the rainwater!
My first time seeing snails in real life! They were so cute, but kind of icky at the same time because you could see globs of slime in some places.