Los Puestos

The puestos are really where we get the bulk of our clinical work. Each student has their own puesto for 4 month, I have been working with students at different puestos. As you can see from the pictures, the puestos have very limited supplies / medications / resources. However, they serve as a first contact for the most impoverished people of Guatemala


A typical puesto clinic / office. Below, one of the puestos had a hands free stethoscope – pretty advanced technology, I'm thinking of taking it with me back to the states. Additionally, some pictures of the surrounding houses. Most are wood / siding, with dirt floor. Many families live with livestock, and have no access to clean water / sewage systems.

The people living in the rural areas are usually of Mayan descent (note the difference in appearance from the Guatemalan medical students and the local people). Thirty years of civil war, which ended just 10 years ago, has kept many of these populations living in extreme poverty, often living off of about 30-40 cents per day (approx 2-3 Quetzal)

Typical diet depends on level of poverty. The most impoverished will typically have 1-2 tortillas (corn) – the staple food of Guatemala, tea, and occasional frijol (black beans are the most popular here in Guatemala). With a bit more money, the diet adds rice, plantains, eggs, and occasional chicken. The most well off surrounding the puestos will add in fruit, vegetables.

Of course, there is a downside. Here, soda, chips and cookies only cost around 15 cents. And, with effective advertising and low levels of education, many of the Mayan people think that beautiful, healthy people drink soda and eat chips / sweets. As such many of the kids have rather poor diets / rotting teeth. It is pretty sad when you have to pull permanent teeth from a 15 year old kid.


That is what has been amazing about medicine in Guatemala - in such a poor country, you really see the effects of disease. My mom always warned me that soda would rot my teeth, but, coming here, you actually see the long term effect. Diseases like cancer, diabetes, congenital malformations are not detected until they have advanced far beyond what we normally see in the US. Of course, it can be sad as well, as, usually, there are few resources to help these individuals.