Healthcare Placements in Nepal | Medical Electives in Asia

Awe-inspiring mountains, intricate temples, lively festivals, and prayer flags make Pokhara a no-brainer if you like travel.You can go climbing or paragliding in the Himalayas, whitewater rafting, wander around the city’s craft shops, row across of Phewa Lake or visit the Tibetan temples and markets.

Nepal Highlights

Amble along the winding lanes of the ancient city
Breathe deeply and enjoy hilltop yoga at sunrise
Go trekking in the foothills of the Himalayas
Paddle across the still waters of Phewa Lake
Visit bustling street markets and immerse yourself in community life

The Work the World House

Living in the Work the World house will be a highlight of your experience in Pokhara. The house is like your home from home, and living with healthcare studentsand graduates from around the world gives the house a social vibe.

Our house in Pokhara is within walking distance of Lakeside — Pokhara’s backpacker hotspot. Fringing the beautiful Phewa Lake you’ll find laid-back bars, live music, a diversity of restaurants, paragliding and whitewater rafting tour agencies, coffee shops, used book shops…. You name it. The house has areas for both socialising and spending time alone when you want some space.

To quite literally top it off, from the roof terrace you have unobstructed views of the snow-capped Himalayan Mountains that need to be seen to be believed.

In-Country Team

Management team: Based in the house, they oversee your entire Work the World experience — 24/7 — from the moment you land to the moment you leaveCatering team: Cook a variety of both local cuisine and familiar home comforts, accommodating all dietary requirementsHousekeeper: Keeps the house clean and tidy from top to bottom, making sure you're comfortableLanguage teacher: Visits the house twice per-week. During their lessons, you’ll learn everyday phrases and clinical terminology to help you get more from your placementSecurity team: Monitor the house 24/7 for your peace of mind

Support in the Hospital

The in-country team will take you around your placement hospital before you start. This informal visit is to introduce you to department staff and your supervisors, helping you find your feet. The in-country team will also visit you while you’re on placement to ensure everything is running smoothly.

Before your placement starts, we establish who your in-hospital supervisors are. Be proactive in your approach to them and they’ll offer you an insider perspective that you can get only from a local practitioner.

The underlying idea is that we support you all the way through your time in the hospital.

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We know plans can change so once you’ve secured your space, you can make unlimited changes to your travel dates, absolutely free.

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Placements in Pokhara

Medical Electives

On a medical elective in Nepal, you can see communicable diseases from TB to typhoid. Spending time in general medicine will allow you to learn from a team of specialists. They have expertise in heart disease, GI system, kidneys, joints, immune and endocrine disorders… you name it. There is also a specialist clinic for pulmonary and diabetic patients — you can get experience here too if it’s an area of interest. To see how local surgeons approach myomectomies, laparotomies and hysterectomies, you can spend some time in the OBG theatre. It’s also possible for you to gain some insight into leprosy rehabilitation, obscure skin conditions, rheumatic fever, and worm infestations.

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Nursing Placements

On your nursing placement in Pokhara, you’ll learn that, rather than nurses, it is families who deliver patient bedside care. This leaves you to focus on the more clinical aspects of nursing. In one of our partner hospitals (we have a few), you can focus in on specialist areas of interest too. Nursing in Nepal is is very diverse compared to what you're used to back home, you will also be able to accompany local students on ward rounds, exchanging skills and information that you’d otherwise never have access to.

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Midwifery Placements

The busy wards in our partner hospital means a higher number of birthing complications than you're used to. For example, some births involve malpresentation, asphyxia and breech births. You can learn how local midwives tackle these issues while battling severe resource limitations. There’s plenty more to experience on this placement — delivering babies is only a part of the job. Our relationships with maternity departments in around the city allow you to get involved in everything from ward rounds to neonatal intensive care.

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Physiotherapy Placement, Nepal (Pokhara)

Physiotherapy Placements

You’ll undertake your placement in a highly specialised rehabilitation hospital. The hospital’s goal is to improve patients’ quality of life and teaching them how to better look after themselves along the way. You’ll spend time alongside specialists, learning how resource limitations affect the quality of care they’re able to provide. In terms of cases, you’ll see things like strokes, degenerative disorders, soft tissue injuries, neuromuscular disorders, musculoskeletal conditions, spinal cord injuries, post-amputation rehabilitation, pain management, and delayed developmental milestones (among others).

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Paramedic Science Placements

In Pokhara, hailing a taxi is often a quicker way to get to hospital than calling an ambulance. As a result, you’ll spend most of your time seeing emergency cases as they come into the ED. Ambulances do, however, come into their own when there are mass casualties resulting from major incidents. One of our partner hospitals even has one of the few specialist ICU ambulances that exist in Nepal. When it comes to the cases themselves, you’ll see everything from paediatric typhoid to domestic abuse injuries.

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Radiography Placements

This large radiography department has a strong range of facilities by local standards. This includes X-ray machines, CT scanners and an MRI scanner. These services are offered at a reasonable rate in comparison to other private hospitals in Pokhara. The number of patients varies, but typically there are around 20 to 30 patients for USG and CT scan, up to 100 patients for X-ray and two to three patients for the MRI scan per day. This is a busy department, and the experience you’ll get as a radiography student is second to none.

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Pharmacy Placements

Despite limited resources, both dispensaries in our partner hospitals do their best to remain well supplied, including stocking rare strains of anti-venom — Pokhara has a variety of venomous snakes and insects. You can shadow doctors to learn about medication plans for inpatients, help prepare prescriptions and dispense medicines. You can also spend time in the department’s pharmacovigilance unit that monitors and prevents adverse effects associated with pharmaceuticals.

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Dentistry Electives

The dentistry department in our partner hospital receives a good number of outpatients. Here, you can observe a range of procedures like fillings, root canals, scaling, RCT, brace fittings, and both cleft lip and palate surgeries. The department has a variety of specialists — maxillofacial surgeons for example — whose expertise you’ll can tap into at your leisure.

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Prices

Destinations						1 Week			2 Weeks			3 Weeks			4 Weeks			5 Weeks			6 Weeks			Extra Week
Nepal Pokhara						$2340			$2640			$2940			$3240			$3540			$3840			$700

*Prices above are in addition to a $500 registration fee.

See full inclusions list

VILLAGE HEALTHCARE WEEK

After your placement in Pokhara, you can spend this additional week becoming part of a rural village family in the Himalayan foothills. In the mornings, you’ll spend time in a health outpost treating villagers with even fewer resources than the city hospitals have. Your afternoons are all about getting to grips with local culture, customs and community. Accompanied by our guide, you can get involved in bread making, trying out traditional clothing, hiking to Hindu temples, taking part in cooking lessons, visiting village schools, and more.

READ ABOUT LAURA'S VILLAGE EXPERIENCE

"I did my placement in the ER of a teaching hospital. I thoroughly enjoyed the placement and gained an appreciation for how lucky I am to have access to Australian healthcare"

Nathan Kendall, James Cook University 2020

"I observed a variety of neurological rehab cases that were all memorable for different reasons."

Bethan Wesley, Cardiff University 2020

"All of us had the most amazing experience and it’s not something we will ever forget."

Rachel Green, Hannah Jeavons, Sonia Takhar & Caroline Furey, Birmingham City University 2019

"I assisted with pre-op assessments and took detailed histories from patients."

Tejas Harita, Queen's University, Belfast 2019

"Through all of these new experiences, I got to know myself a lot better than before."

Hiva Hamzavizarghani, University of Manchester 2019

WHAT HEALTHCARE DISCIPLINES DO WORK THE WORLD CATER FOR?

Work the World organise supervised healthcare electives and placements for the following disciplines: - 1. Medical 2. Nursing 3. Midwifery 4. Physiotherapy 5. Radiography 6. Pharmacy 7. Dentistry 8. Occupational Therapy 9. Paramedic Science

WHAT OTHER COUNTRIES CAN I TRAVEL TO ON A WORK THE WORLD PLACEMENT?

Work the World provides a huge variety of flexible placement opportunities throughout Asia, Africa and Latin America. These include 1. Tanzania 2. Indonesia 3. Vietnam 4. Mexico 5. Ghana 6. The Philippines 7. Nepal 8. Sri Lanka 9. Zambia

WHAT IS THE WORK THE WORLD HOUSE LIKE IN POKHARA, NEPAL?

The location of the Work the World house gives you the major advantage of being within walking distance of Lakeside - Pokhara’s backpacker hotspot. The house itself has plenty of space. From the roof terrace, you have unobstructed views of the snow-capped Himalayan Mountains, which need to be seen to be believed.

Placements In Nepal

Pokhara