Clinics and Classes in Chiang Mai!

Today we spent our morning at Chiang Mai University hospital, where be broke off into smaller groups. Marina and I went to visit the heart failure clinic, which was definitely a great experience.

Marina showing her love for cardiology

Our pharmacist host, Kwan was happy to have us, and eager for us to jump right in. We started the morning consulting on a warfarin patient, and were able to make recommendations on how we should dose the patient, and when she should come in for follow up.

The patient's warfarin information and INR record book.

 Next Marina and I were able to look through a patient chart, that went back for about 5 years. We were able to piece together this patient's story, including imaging studies, ekg charts, past clinical notes, and of course the med list. This patient's meds looked pretty good, and he has been stable for a while.

The med list section of the clinic documentation sheet

We saw a few more patients and made a few more recommendations, then we reviewed some medications with Kwan, as clinic patients first come to the clinic and see the doctor, then they go down to the pharmacy to pick up their refills or any medications that may have changed, and return to the clinic to go through them with the pharmacist. During this time we learned some of the Thai brand names for common drugs used in the US, and saw that some inhalers come packed with a space in the box, which is very different from the States, where you have to have a separate script for the spacer. Sadly, we soon had to leave, but Kwan made sure we had a great morning, and made sure to ask us lots of clinical questions!

Next we headed off for lunch as a group.

As you can see from the pictures the restaurant was kind of funky and eclectic.

We finished off the day back at Chiang Mai University, sitting in with some 5th year pharmacy students. Our group shared what community pharmacy is like in the US, and compared and contrasted it with community pharmacy in Thailand. The Thai students then shared presentations that they had prepared for us on community pharmacy, primary care units, hospital pharmacy and ambulatory care pharmacy in their country. They did a great job explaining pharmacy in their country, and were very eager to hear about how things work in the US. We also stopped by the college gift shop, where most of us bought new pins for our white coats with the CMU logo, which is an elephant with holding a lamp over it's head (there's a picture of the logo down below!)

Our students talking about community, and the CMU students giving their presentations. 

The sign outside the book store with the CMU logo

When we finished teaching each other, we took a quick group photo, then headed back to the hotel for some downtime before everyone headed off for dinner. Overall, it was another great day in Thailand!

-Amanda

One big happy pharmacy family!