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Nurse helps people in Mexico
By Bruce Walton
YOUNGSTOWN
Cynthia Daniels, 58, of Liberty, said her April trip as a nurse in San Quintin, Mexico, was a humbling experience.
Daniels, a nursing instructor at Youngstown State University and a nurse practitioner at Associates in Women’s Health in Youngstown, has made this trip two times, the first in 2015.
The trip, known as the Study Abroad Medical Mission, was founded by its organizer and nursing instructor at YSU, Pamela Schuster. The mission, which took place April 19 to 23, has been a collaboration between YSU and Good Hope Lutheran Church for about a decade. The mission provides an eclectic group of nursing medical students to set up a clinic in Mexico for impoverished citizens for a week.
The group consists of students and nurse practitioners from YSU such as Daniels as well as students from the University of Toledo and Kent State University. In the short time the group was there, it treated more than 120 patients. Daniels practices as an OB-GYN and said she helped many young women from age 12 and older. Daniels added she enjoys the work she does helping women.
“I try to not to make that experience for women as tense, or I try to help them relax,” she said.
For years, Schuster asked her to join the trip, but Daniels couldn’t join because of schedule conflicts, but finally attended the mission last year. Daniels treated patients with a head-to-toe assessment and consultation and then sent them to a pharmacy with a prescription for any treatable illnesses.
Daniels said the best thing the trip provides is helping those living worse off than what any of those visiting have lived through. Other than medical treatment, the residents of the area have difficulties getting the most basic needs such as water and reliable shelter.
“It just breaks your heart to see it and to be thankful for all that you have and to be appreciative,” she said.
One of the most memorable things to occur was with a woman she treated who suffered from an illness. Daniels did as much as she could and gave her pharmaceutical treatment she already knew she needed but couldn’t afford. Daniels gave her payment for the drugs, and before the group left, the woman returned to say the bleeding had stopped just before they left.
“If nothing else comes out of it, you will definitely come back a different person as far as an attitude of gratitude,” she said.