Hello there,

Its a rainy afternoon here in Chiang Mai so I figured I would update y'all on the past couple days. Yesterday we visited a portion of Chiang Mai Universitys hospital and got a little tour of their wards and their accommodations that included a PT center along with a skin center. Everything was super high tech and modern which took me by surprise since a lot of the hospitals and pharmacies we have been seeing have been semi old and run down. I found out a fun fact that the buildings in Chiang Mai can only be a max of 4 stories due to the government wanting the tourists to be able to see the surrounding mountains at all times.

After lunch we headed to a psych hospital called Suanprung Hospital. It comprises of 700 beds that take patients from 13 provinces. They deal with mental health (ex alcohol related) and psych problems such as schizophrenia, bipolar, stimulant use and depression. They offer programs such as counseling services for the families and friends of patients as well as 'knowledge transfer' which allows students from all over the world come and interact with the doctors and staff. We had the opportunity to visit wards that were for acutely ill and then aggressive patients. It was crazy to see how these patients were kept, there was no AC and man was it hot. It makes me appreciate the facilities back in the USA for patients with this condition. Stay tuned for my next blog post about chips!

TTYL,

Carly Wershoven