Prompt 1: Making Connections

    Many might think their health is only involved with themselves in the hospital they go to and to the pharmacy where they pick up their medicine. But it’s so much more than that, the trained staff at these hospitals may have come from another country and brought their skills and beliefs to their place of work. The pharmacists giving the medicine to their patients may have learned from a country from another site. Down below, are a few examples of how my health can be viewed as more global than local and why that is. 

    This is the first example of the connection of my health being global more than local. So I am from Henderson, KY, a small town just like any other town, doesn’t have many attractions or places to see, but enough where there is food and shelter to live a sustainable life. Growing up here, I never had any issue eating and there were plenty of days when I ate many different types of delicious foods. Not only that, Henderson focused heavily on education and not just academics, but also dietary needs and other parts of health such as physical and mental. Because of this, I consider myself that I was knowledgeable enough to take care of myself. To this day, I never had any medical issues in the past and I made sure that I ate proper dietary foods so no other medical issues arise in the future. But it was not like that for my grandfather that lived his childhood and adulthood in India. In many parts of India, many people don’t receive proper education about even the smallest of things. Not only that, some families couldn’t make enough to provide for the whole family so the kids of the family would also have to work as well. My grandfather fell into this so there were some days where my grandfather would have to eat unhealthy just to have something in his stomach. After some time, after going to the hospital in and out, my grandfather got diagnosed with diabetes. In this way, even though my health in Kentucky was great, I have the chance of getting diabetes in the future because of how my grandfather used to live back in India. 

       My second example of the connection to my health is more global than local. In America, all the medicine that is given to everybody for whatever they need is usually medically manufactured by mixing several different types of chemicals together. As an American, I never gave it much thought to what medicine I’m taking when I have a common cold or what a vaccine is made of when taking the flu shot. That information is just a click away for people that are curious like me. There are some medicines given that are considered light because they have been manufactured that way to treat colds, fevers, and headaches. But there are also medicines out there that have been studied in labs repeatedly because they are antibiotics for bacteria that keep mutating to be resistant to antibiotics. But this is all different for my grandmother’s family that didn’t have access to medicines small or big. In India, my grandmother’s family depended on herbal medicines to treat their colds and major issues such as dealing with diabetes or high levels of cholesterol. So even now, I am taking herbal medicines because since I was young, I have been dealing with digestion issues. Headaches are frequent for me because of my digestion issues and after taking herbal medicine, I feel as if herbal medicine is more effective than medicine that is chemically manufactured. In this way, the medicine I take now is considered more foreign because it is uncommon in America for people to take herbal medicine. But in places like India and other parts of Asia, it is common practice to use herbal medicine as a form of treatment and new studies show the effectiveness of these types of medicines. 

    My third example of the connection to my health is more global than local. There aren’t many times where I have been to the hospital because I broke my leg or needed surgery because of internal medical issues. There were only just two times in my life when I went to the hospital for that type of treatment. The first time I had surgery was in Chicago because I had an infection in my bladder because my kidney was not properly getting rid of waste. Because of this, I needed immediate surgery so that more waste wouldn’t infect my bladder even more. The surgeon that was operating on me wasn’t from America but was from Europe. At the time, I was too little to understand what conversations they had but my mother told me when I was a little older what they discuss. My mother had told me that after the success, the surgeon was explaining to my parents how the healthcare system here is much different from Europe and everywhere else in the world. The medical infrastructure in Europe is stable and balanced compared to America. Many citizens of Europe agree that they aren’t stressed about worrying about financials like many Americans are. Not only that, but this surgeon also treated me with care and my parents noticed that plenty of times. He informed them of the whole process and answered all the questions happily. In this way, the one time I had a critical surgery, the surgery was done in a way where it felt like how surgery was done in Europe. The environment felt normal, not stressful at all, and the whole surgery process went smoothly as well. This surgery reflects how medical care is around the world and why sometimes, they are viewed as better than America.