2014 is a year that holds the start of an amazing learning opportunity for the nurses at Noahs Crossing Veterinary Clinic. Every year one nurse will be given the chance to apply to be a part of the Free The Bears nurse exchange program. Free The Bears is an organisation that creates rehabilitation centres and hospitals for sick and/or injured bears; this includes creating on-going home sanctuaries for the bears to live in and be behaviourally enriched. Their most important work of course is making the world aware and educating people of the cruel and torturous acts that are still being practiced on a wide variety of bears in certain countries. They are striving to bring bile farming to a complete end and to stop any other unfair treatment bears receive. Our practice manager Jo has been the one who started this friendship with Free The Bears over 8 years ago and included Noahs Crossing Veterinary Clinic approximately 6 years ago. Since then, the clinic has done some amazing things for the organisation such as donating hospital equipment and supplying veterinary assistance whenever possible. The nurse exchange program is a wonderful opportunity for skills and knowledge to be shared throughout everyone involved. This program will open up many doors for not only the nurse travelling overseas but also to the Free The Bears dedicated team member that we will be joining us at our clinic at a later date next year. It has turned out that I, Alicia, have been selected and truly blessed to be given this opportunity of a life time to travel to Cambodia and assist in their program. I am so excited to be a part of such a beautiful organisation that employs a range of strategies including environmental education, conservation research so that they can achieve their mission to protect, preserve and enrich the lives of bears throughout the world. The plan this year is to take over a new Blood chemistry analyser (Which Jo is taking over very soon!) and teach the clinic staff how to run in-house bloods on the bears. This will ensure quick results and ease of diagnosing illness. This past week I have been busy gathering as much information as I can about the particular model of blood analyser we are taking over. The reason for this is so i can then translate it into an easier format for them to understand; and then once over in Cambodia it can then be translated into Khmer. Jo and I have recently participated in a meeting with Donna from IDEXX who explained the blood machines operation instructions and maintenance. I have also been setting up an oxygen concentrator that I will be taking over for use in their hospital. The hardest part of this task so far has been trying to make sure that all the connections are compatible to everything over in Cambodia of course! I have also faced the challenge of a baggage allowance, I am able to have 30kg of baggage but the oxygen concentrator itself weighs 29.5kg! Looks like one pair of undies is on the cards! The main challenge I believe I will face will be trying to figure out how i am going to apply my teaching skills during the program. The main obstacle of course is the language barrier. I wouldnt say I am nervous or worried about this challenge, but more excited and determined. My goal is to create life time friendships with the workers, learn and respect every aspect of their culture and of course play a part in protecting the lives of bears.
Posted on: Sun, 26 Oct 2014 09:49:12 +0000
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