Work Life So Far

Friday was my first day of work at Deep Griha. There were three other new volunteers and the four of us basically got a tour of the whole place and the slum community on Tadiwala Road, but I still want to go explore the community more. In the mornings, I generally go to Sassoon Hospital, the government run hospital in Pune, to help out with the ART treatment. My job is essentially to give the patients their CD4 report when they come in. It gets to be a bit boring, but at least I have patient contact. It's incredible how many people are lined up for ART treatment daily. There must be at least 40-50 each day.
Here's some pictures from Sassoon. The first one is of my roommate.


We usually get back to Tadiwala around lunchtime and eat lunch with the DISHA (Deep Griha's Integrated Service for HIV/AIDS) ladies. My work at Deep is mostly involved with DISHA, as is most people who are volunteering here. It is probably the most successful, most funded, and most elaborate program at the organization. The terrace is completely dedicated to clients who have tested positive. I spend most of my time with the clients there, and the rest in the office one floor below.
Yesterday, we went to Sahara, a hospice for HIV positive patients who essentially have no one to care for them. The hospice started out as a palliative care center, but they have now expanded to rehabilitation as well. One of the patients passed away while we were there. He had been so severely ill that he was taken to the hospital the day before. But because the family didn't want to have to pay for the treatment, they had him discharged and brought back to Sahara that day. He died shortly after. A patient in the slums of Tadiwala also passed away yesterday. One of the volunteers, Morgan, who has been here since about February, said that it was so sad to see the stigma that was still there. The brother and sister of the man who passed away, rather than mourning the loss of their brother, were telling the doctors to cover him with plastic so that they wouldn't catch HIV/AIDS. They had just been waiting for the man to die. It is so ridiculous how prevalent the stigma still is, even amongst family members. Here are some pictures from Sahara.




My research is also going pretty well, although I haven't begun data collection yet. I met with Dr. Sangre at Sassoon Hospital, and she told me I could get about 300 patients worth of data on the day of the clinic. Unfortunately the next clinic day will be in August, so I'll have to have some patience. In the meantime, I hope I can interview some doctors in the area to gain insight on their point of view about how their patients approach epilepsy and the treatment of it.