Three medical experts from the burn center at University Hospitals in Iowa City will travel to India this week on a mission to train medical professionals there how to better treat burn injuries. Corey McGee is an occupational therapist at the U-of-I. McGee will be accompanied by a burn surgeon and a burn nurse on the two-week trip.
McGee says they’re going to a fairly industrialized area of southeast India called Vellore where there’s a Christian-affiliated hospital. He says they’ll be educating surgeons, nurses and therapists on providing “optimum burn care” based on their resources. He says most of the people they’ll be dealing with speak English, so there shouldn’t be much difficulty communicating.
McGee says there will likely be more cultural barriers than language barriers. He says they’ve been researching things like etiquette, dress codes and eating habits so they’ll fit in. McGee is leaving for India on Wednesday with Dr. Barbara Latenser and nurse Bridget Burke. They’ll return May 3rd.