Hi everyone! Today is Tuesday, and we got up so early! My roommate Emily and I awoke to our alarms around 6:00 AM. We got ready and headed down to the lobby to meet with our group before catching a taxi to a nursing home! The ride took around 15 minutes. Once we arrived, we were taken into the pub, which is part of the nursing home. The elderly go there to drink and play games. They also have trivia night! One thing I noticed was the theme of the home. It had many areas that resembled homes back in the 1950s and 1960s. This is to try and provoke some sort of comfort feeling and memory within patients who are losing memory. It has been scientifically proven to help patients regain some memory by seeing and being in an environment that is very familiar in comparison to the world we live in today. 

From there, we were split into two groups. One group stayed and played games, while the other group got personal nurses to shadow. I was in the group that received personal nurses! Me and two other friends were taken into a back room where they store all of the resident’s medication. The nurses showed us how to read the patient’s record and how to pack a cart with the correct medications. The nurse I was assigned to was Yevette, and she was absolutely wonderful! She looked exactly like Sarah Paulson. She told me that her daughter’s name is Liv too! 

Yevette took me to the second floor, where she administers medications to her assigned patients. She took the cart with us and wheeled it to the elevator. The cart contains all of the medications and the patient’s personal books. The books include so much information on the patients—even tips on how they like to take their pills. She took me to all of the rooms and introduced me to her patients who felt up to talking. One patient was on a portable oxygen mask so he could walk around, which was thoughtful! I took a particular liking to a patient. He is 87 years old, and his birthday is February 18th. I went to give him his medications with Yevette, just like we did with the rest of the patients. He talked to me more than the other patients and was telling me all about Cricket. He showed me pictures of his wife, who had passed away a long time ago, and of his cricket team from the 1960s! He even had a pillow that said, “I would rather be playing cricket.” I said bye and walked out with Yevette. 

She told me that I reminded him of his niece, who is the closest thing he has to a child. She commented on how many older people go into depressive episodes due to many reasons and that they all have a sadness to them. She also said that his face lit up whenever I showed interest in his life. I just had to go back. I asked her if it would be alright if I went back to hang out with him, and she was delighted to give her approval! I ran back to his room and asked him if I could stay and talk to him. He said yes and suggested we grab some tea from downstairs. We made our way to the first floor, and he introduced me to his friends. We talked about cricket and football. He was intrigued that I also played football, and we were able to have a really good chat about our experiences playing the sport. He asked me if I had ever played this one game I had never heard of before. It turns out it is what we call “pool” in the US. Theirs was smaller, and the pool balls were not as weighted compared to ours back home. He sat in a chair and coached me on how to get my shot perfect. I was a pro by the end. He kept encouraging me to try again, and he was very kind. He took a couple shots and was insanely good. I was very impressed! Then his friend came to visit him, and we all talked together. They both taught me how to play dominoes! I had such a great time and was so sad to say goodbye.

We left the nursing home around 1:00 and traveled to BCU by Uber for our 3:00 lecture. We had a presentation about endometriosis by a lady from Michigan! Endometriosis was considered rare in the 1980s. It affects 6–10% of women and 1.5 million women in the UK. These numbers are on par with diabetes diagnoses. Endometriosis is a chronic systemic inflammatory disease, as it is a full-body condition. A few signs are pelvic pain, infertility, etc. There have been no cures or treatment breakthroughs for the past three decades. Laparoscopic surgery remains the best way to detect and provide a diagnosis. The time for diagnosis can take 8–9 years, and this waiting time has unfortunately gone up due to COVID. This takes so long because a skilled surgeon must be available since that is the only way to diagnose the disease. There is a normalization and a dismissal of women’s pain; therefore, they are often misdiagnosed. 

Tonight we have the night free since it is our last night in Birmingham.

I will blog more tomorrow! Thanks for reading!