Today’s adventure started a bit earlier than yesterday’s adventure. We went over to BCUs City South Campus for the first time! The weather in Birmingham has been so wonderful and warm, which is not what I was expecting. The nice weather made for a lovely walk to the campus from our hotel. When we got there, we got some coffee before going to the classroom and starting our lecture on public health. I learned so much about the impact of public health on our hospitals and found this lecture very interesting. For example, did you know that the seat belt law – introduced in 1983 – reduced fatalities by 25%? This is one of many example of public health that we talked about. We also learned that public health had a positive impact on healthcare. Better public health leads to less people needing to go to the hospital. Overall, this is better for everybody. Furthermore, the more favorable someone’s circumstances are, the better off they are. This would make sense, because in any country if you have money, you have more opportunities.
Next, we talked about Female Genital Mutilation (FGM). I had never heard about this topic before, so I was interested to learn more about it. I learned that there are 4 different types of FGM, and we talked about what each are and the side effects of each of them. While this was a heavy topic, I am glad we were able to talk about it and learn more about it. We also had a lecture on mental health in nursing, which is a super important topic not only in the UK, but in the US. During this presentation, He started off with talking about the history of Birmingham and tying it in with mental health in nursing. I found the history of Birmingham super interesting. We learned that Birmingham is the UK’s first minority-majority city, meaning that the majority of the people that live there are in the minority. The speaker also told us stories about some of his friends who are in the minority and how their lives are different from those who are from the UK, and how it affected their mental health.
Finally, the last topic we learned about was HIV and sexual health in nursing. This lecture was my favorite lecture out of all of them. I had to write a paper about HIV during my first semester, so hearing about HIV from a specialist’s point of view furthered my understanding about HIV, which was awesome. I loved hearing all of the stories she had about some of their patients, and learning more about the stigmas around HIV. We ended our day with a dinner with some BCU staff and students, where I had bangers and mash for dinner and learned more about what is it like to teach and work as a nurse in the UK from BCU graduates. Today was another great day in Birmingham, but I am excited we get to sleep in tomorrow (until 8)!
