The first week was spent with the other six interns and the FSD coordinator in orientation sessions. I thought that these lectures were valuable, since I have never taken a development course. We went over a lot of information on different development strategies and real world examples. Most of that week was spent in Masaya with a temporary host family, until Wednesday when the orientation finished and I left for Jinotepe, which is about 45 minutes from Masaya. I'm working at the Puesto de Salud Pedro Nervaez Cisneros, a small health post (with only about eight staff) that is only a ten minute walk from my house. That Thursday I spent the morning going out, with a doctor and one of the nurses, into the community to help with their vaccination campaigns.
The following week, I spent most of the mornings continuing with the vaccinations. Sometimes we went to the rural communities a little outside of Jinotepe and other times to central places in the city, such the bus stop or the market, where there is a lot of movement and where diseases could easily spread if people are not vaccinated. In the afternoons, my supervisor and I have been working on deciding on a project for me. We decided that I am going to work on training consejeras in two of the rural communities around Jinotepe. Consejeras are basically community health workers except they are only trained in maternal health and family planning skills. In addition to that, I am going to be giving weekly charlas, or short lectures, to a club of pregnant women in another nearby community on topics relevant to pregnancy and overall reproductive health. The end goal is to compile these charlas into a manual that the women can use to give the charlas to new pregnant mothers after I leave.