Dominican Republic Service Mission

Sierra Fife
Office of Learning Abroad
May 10th – 18th 2019

Project Summary
During this project, I spent a little over a week
in the Dominican Republic providing basic medical
care to those who couldn’t afford or get transport to a
hospital. Throughout this time, I worked alongside
doctors and nurses from Rock Solid International as a
pharmacy tech, triage nurse, registrar and medical
assistant to ensure that the residents were getting the
care that they needed.
What I learned through this experience is that
healthcare is not always available to people like it is in
the United States. I also learned that we as Americans
tend to not realize how lucky there are to be able to
have food on our tables and a house to live in. Lastly, I
Students taking the vital signs of a patients at the health
found that Dominicans are always accepting to any
clinic held in one of the villages around the Dominican.
visitors of their country and are very grateful for
This was done in the triage portion of the clinic in which
everything that the volunteers are willing to do. their vital signs would be taken so that the providers could
determine if the patients had high blood pressure or other
Project Highlights complications.

• Working to better peoples lives through basic

medical care
• Learning about healthcare and the availability of
treatments and medicines in the Dominican
• This trip has allowed me to realize that life is very
precious and solidified my future endeavors of
wanting to be a nurse

From My Journal
“Today we traveled to a village near the Haitian
border. We set up the clinic in a small school
which most of the patients that we saw were
children and their families. I learned that although
the Dominican Republic and Haiti are neighboring Patients meeting with the Solid Rock International healthcare
providers, students and ministry assistants to receive a
places, the Dominicans don’t like when the
diagnosis and medications to help ease their symptoms. The
Haitians come into their country. It was also doctors would review their symptoms and have the students
interesting to experience the differences in write the scripts for the medication that the Dominicans
languages spoken by the people that we were able needed so that the students in the pharmacy were able to give
to see”. the patients the right prescription.