Filmmaker and vice-provost for MTSU International Affairs Dr. Ric Morris premiered his documentary Medicine in Guatemala at the Keathley University Center theater Tuesday night.
The film followed a group of MTSU nursing students and faculty members who traveled to Los Robles, Guatemala last summer in order to treat residents who had little access to hospitals.
With $12,000 raised from donations and fundraisers, the students opened their own medical clinic for one week, complete with 50-pounds worth of clinical supplies. The clinic was used not only to treat illnesses but also to educate on hygiene and anatomy.
All the rural, yet colorful, parts of the Guatemalan countryside were featured throughout Morris’ film, as well as the country’s insurmountable poverty.
In one scene, a nurse is shown caring for a sixteen-year-old girl and her malnourished child who weighed only six-pounds.
“The weight of premature baby,” the nurse said.
The film was followed by a very brief Q&A Session, during which Morris stated that he did not know where he would be filming next.
This is the second year that nursing students have traveled to Guatemala, but it likely will not be the last.
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