Tuesday, February 26

As our days in beautiful Buenos Aires are coming to an end, the CBU nursing students and staff are trying to pack in as much learning, sight seeing, and souvenir shopping as we can before our bitter-sweet goodbye. Luckily for you guys, Taylor Allan and Kara Warren are here to tell you about our Tuesday.

Today, we had our second last early wake-up and travelled to our clinical projects. Today Taylor Allan and the rest of the students who are assigned to the Roffo Hospital were greeted with an opportunity to tour the palliative care unit of the hospital. The unit was unremarkable as you were welcomed with a sense of home. Families gather around a large kitchen table for meals and beloved Maté with their loved ones. Colorful drawings lined the walls, with a small library, arts and crafts center, and a wig room for the patients and their families to enjoy.

There are many volunteers at the Roffo Hospital, and luckily for the patients, many of these volunteers offer free non-pharmaceutical therapies to help relieve the patient’s pain, anxiety, or stress. Today we learned about sounds therapy also known as singing bowl therapy. The volunteer spins the turning fork around the bowl and creating vibrations that are transmitted to the pressure points and areas of stress on the patient’s body. This therapy helps to reduce pain, depression, anxiety, stress, and improve memory!

Kara went to her placement at the Gutiérrez Hospital de Niños for the morning, and got to play with the kids waiting in the ER. The volunteers provide recreational activities in the emergency room, including books, colouring pages, blocks, and lots of other toys. The children loved all of the activities, and were very curious about the volunteers. Some of the older kids were even teaching the students how to say some colours in Spanish using crayons.

Nearing the end of our trip, most of the students spent the afternoon visiting the different attractions around the city. Some went to La Boca and got souvenirs to bring back to their friends and family, others visited the Recoleta cemetery to view some of the noteworthy above ground vaults. 

At 5:30 the CBU Nursing students and staff were greeted by Victor Piccininni, the author of “El Arte de Acompanar” (The Art of Accompanying) who was able to give us a presentation related to his views and ideas about palliative care. Mr. Piccininni really stressed the importance of what he feels to be the 3 stages of the dying process; chaos, acceptation, and transcendence. We had a great discussion about how families also go through the dying process with the patient, and how important it is for the family to help the patients follow through the process instead of interfering. Promising patients that they are going to be okay, may give them a false sense of hope which would interfere with their dying process. “We don’t accompany someone’s death or illness. We accompany the process of the good dying of a person and we put ourselves in the disposition to give our best help so that that person transits from the chaos, passing through the acceptance… until arriving at the spiritual transcendence. Thus, we witness the birth of a new being that will continue with its evolutionary process.” -Victor Piccininni.