An instructor and two students from Lambton College's nursing program are embarking on a two-week learning trip to Jamaica, attending to homeless people and children.

Lambton College

Instructor Marilyn Couture will be accompanied by third-year nursing students Jon Tino and Toby Miller on a trip to three out-patient clinics, a residential home for homeless people and two children's homes.

"This trip will increase their awareness about poverty and that will be important to their nursing skills," said Couture, who is exploring the possibility of developing Jamaica as a nursing education opportunity for the future.

Already, she heads up an elective course for second-year students that is composed of a two-week trip to the Dominican Republic for similar work.

"The challenge for them will be in adapting to another culture and developing their communication skills," she said.

They will travel under the auspices of Rayjon Share Care of Sarnia Inc., a non-profit organization that builds partnerships through education, development and aid in underdeveloped countries.

From Aug. 25 to Sept. 1, the students will assess and treat patients with guidance from Couture and doctors in Jamaica. They will travel daily from a central location near Mandiville to the rural clinics and homes run by Catholic organizations.

"These places are relatively primitive. They're staffed by volunteers with no regular source of supplies or medication," said Couture, adding the trio will bring donations of medicine.

Third-year nursing students Toby Miller and Jon Tino are ready for the challenge.

"It allows us to see the state of health-care systems in other countries. It also provides the opportunity to truly make a difference in peoples lives," Miller said.

"What attracts me to doing work like this in another country is the fact that we are in an area that we have never been before that anything could happen at any time," Tino said. "It is rewarding and I feel a sense of accomplishment by delivering hands-on nursing care to the people who need it most: the poor."

For the past seven years, Lambton College's nursing program has sent groups of second-year nursing students to clinics run by Sister of Charity in the Dominican Republic.

Both Miller and Tino traveled to the impoverished country to help the sick and the poor.

"It was an experience I will never forget. The things I saw and the people I helped will be embedded in my heart forever," Tino said.


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