Today we went to Austral University, where we attended a lecture where we learned about nursing in its connected hospital, and some of the challenges it faced. One that stuck out to me was the physician/doctor to nurses ratio. In the US, there is normally a higher number of nurses compared to doctors, but in Austral, it is the opposite. This lack of nurses is a result of multiple factors, including little promotion of nurses in Argentinian society, leading to a low social image(although efforts are being made to change this) and low pay. This stuck out to me because at Pitt and in society in the US, nursing is a strongly encouraged and supported profession. After the lecture wrapped up, we were taken on a tour of the hospital, where we visited the oncology, surgical, cardiac, emergency, geriatric, and pediatric wings of the hospital. It was an interesting tour as in Pittsburgh, each specialty is spread out through different hospitals, with each hospital being dedicated to one specialty, but at Austral, they were all together. Walking through the halls of the hospital and seeing everyone at work made me even more excited for my own clinicals, where I’ll be able to take part in that environment. 

Finally, after the lecture and tour, we met up with the university’s students. Although I was nervous at first, the mixer was a lot of fun. I had a great time talking with the girls we met(shoutout to Fiorella, Veronica, Juana, and Carabajal!) about where we were from, our majors, and what we liked doing in our free time. Hailey and I used this opportunity to practice our Spanish. Some of them were taking classes that I had last semester, like Microbio, and it was cool to see the common threads of nursing curriculum across countries! Finally we said our goodbyes and headed on the bus back to the hotel. It was another great day in Buenos Aires, and I made some great new friends!