Nursing is a profession “that does not put limits on you” assured nurses who work in vulnerable contexts, in the midst of intense droughts or floods, in countries in armed conflict or with serious social problems and who developed their vocation through community experiences, This Thursday marks International Nursing Day.
“Nursing does not put limits on you, at most you put them on yourself,” said Silvana Canchi Subelza, a professional with the Salta Red Cross since 2016, who assisted native communities and those in extreme vulnerability in extreme situations such as the avalanche that occurred in Jujuy. in 2013, in the floods in Santa Victoria Este or in the drought that the region suffered in 2020.
Throughout the experiences lived and when making a review of his profession, he highlights nursing as “the right way to return the support and help of people in the course of life”.
“I learned from nursing that we can be in happy and not so happy moments, and intervene in moments of joy or vulnerability,” said Canchi Subelza, who decided to volunteer for the Salta Branch of the Red Cross while she was in her last year. from high school, when he was still searching for his vocation.
He stressed that, within his years of volunteering, which began in 2013, “several events that marked us” as health agents occurred, including the avalanche in Jujuy, where “we were able to work with emergencies and risk and disaster management “.
Meanwhile, in 2018 “a climatic emergency arose in Santa Victoria Este, in the north of Salta, where floods were registered”, which “allowed us the first contact with the original communities of the area”.
There, “from the first moment they assisted, collaborated, made a diagnosis of the situation and worked with the communities,” he said, while detailing that, “after that emergency, in 2020, another one was detected, due to an intense drought in the zone”.
“Nursing does not put limits on you, at most you put them on yourself”Silvana Canchi Subelza
“At that time,” he said, “cases began to emerge of children dying of malnutrition, which set off an alarm and a social and health emergency was declared throughout that region,” so the Red Cross attended and gave him the opportunity to go to the place on the first trip, to make a diagnosis of the situation and get to know the original communities”.
From the field work carried out, it emerged that “the vital thing that the inhabitants of the place lacked was access to safe water, because they did not have a drinking water network” and he detailed. “For me it was like a clash of cultures.”
“I had never been in a native community and we had to work with a reality that was completely different from the one we knew, with the barrier of language and social organization, of idiosyncrasy and its authorities, who were generally men, who addressed directly to men,” he recalled.
In this sense, she recounted the difficulties in adapting, always respecting the culture of the original communities and, at the same time, “trying to make them understand that we were also working for the benefit of their community.”
there are many moments in which I have felt inside a movie and to think that this is the reality of many people, it is a very big blow; It has made me very grateful for my realitySofia Pinero
He indicated that he realized that with nursing “you can not only be in a hospital or with the patient”, but that you can “work with the communities doing check-ups and immunizations, giving talks and workshops, always for the benefit of the people, and teach”.
“I have a lot to continue growing” in this profession “of a lot of humanism and sensitivity,” said Silvana, who assured that there are many nurses who “provide the care they would like to receive if they need it” and added that they always relate to their patients ” with a family member or relative.
For her part, Sofía Piñeiro is a nurse with Doctors Without Borders, an organization that works in contexts of armed conflict or where there is a very acute social conflict that often means that supplies are scarce, which requires the greatest inventiveness and mettle needed to assist patients in difficult times.
“The experience in Doctors Without Borders definitely marked my life, there are many moments in which I have felt inside a movie and to think that this is the reality of many people, it is a very big blow; it has made me very grateful for my reality “, told Télam Sofía.
He assured that although sometimes in humanitarian crisis areas the necessary elements for the care of all diseases are not available or difficult to obtain, it is necessary to “be creative and have a vocation” to manage to move forward with any complex situation “in the best possible way”.
“In the first year of my degree, I realized how in love I was with nursing,” Sofia assured Télam, who stressed that “it was an immense challenge” to work at Doctors Without Borders.
“There are thousands of experiences and anecdotes that I can tell,” says Sofía, and she especially remembers one, on her first mission where, after treating a man’s leg for several weeks, she received a bag of apples “as a token of gratitude.”
“He brought me that gift to thank me not only for curing him but for treating him with respect and for me it was one of the greatest gestures that I have been given in my life,” he recalled.
“Every day you have to learn to manage frustration to continue giving your best even though the result is not always good,” added Piñeiro, 30, a nurse since 2014.
Nursing Day is celebrated on the anniversary of the birth of Florence Nightingale, considered the mother of modern nursing and who dedicated her life to assisting the sick, creating some of the practices and techniques that are used today and that allowed the advancement of this discipline.
The celebration is promoted by the International Nursing Council and it seeks to remember the contribution of nurses to society.
“I will never get tired of this profession, because it allows you, searching, to do many things and work with children, with adults, with pregnant women,” said Canchi Subelza by way of conclusion.
