Clinica de la Calle, CENIT, Quito, Ecuador, 2009

Two or three of us volunteers would go out every Tuesday and Thursday morning to the market, and check blood pressure and blood sugar levels of a handful of vendors. The market was fairly safe compared to most, but just being gringos made us stand out enough, and this was the only day I took a camera with me (as a camera tends to disrupt a lot of things in this type of situation). This day three of us were training two new volunteers in what we were doing, because they were going to take over for us. We took notes and administered some blood pressure pills that CENIT had donations to cover the cost of. There were bigger and better clinics, and CENIT's clinic was staffed only by a nurse and several volunteers. It was part of a school in a part of town where a lot of children worked instead of going to school. The goal was to bring educational and health resources to people who otherwise weren't seeking them out. I never got very accurate at checking blood pressure, so I pricked the fingers and took a blood drop sample from often very dirt-covered and callused fingers to get a blood sugar reading (I don't have footage of this, because I can't multitask).

Category:

Nonprofits & Activism

Tags:

• CENIT
• Centro
• de
• la
• Nina
• Trabajador
• Street
• Clinic
• Medical
• Outreach
• Quito
• Ecuador
• Cisnes
• Caballos