A Day in the Mercado
Yesterday we left our apartment at 6:30am to get out to Milpa Alta and do further field research on Griselda’s business and her community. The first thing we did when we got there was grab some breakfast and walk around the area where Griselda’s clinic is, close to the center of the town in barrio Los Angeles. The Milpa Alta city center is built around the “mercado”, where residents come to buy almost anything, from locally grown vegetables, fresh bread, to even clothing and housing supplies. We were again amazed by the stark difference between La Condesa and Milpa Alta (both communities within Mexico City). Milpa Alta has much more of a “small-town” feel where everyone seems to know each other and most items are locally produced, quite different from all the cafes and international cuisine in La Condesa.
The purpose of our visit to Griselda’s clinic yesterday was to observe her patients, how the clinic services them, and what their needs are. During the two hours that we were observing, three families came in for different services. Two of them had small children who needed blood tests for their school documents, and one was an older woman who requested her yearly test for cervical cancer. Griselda was able to perform all of these tests herself and it also became clear that she formed a personal relationship with each of her clients and that they felt comfortable coming to her clinic. Griselda says that her clinic serves an average of 12 patients a day. Her clinic is open for about 12 hours a day so this would mean about 1 person per hour, and based on our morning drop-in yesterday, we got to observe that this was true. We also believe that this number will dramatically increase (by at least 50%) once she has her own ultrasound machine. Another nice part about the clinic was that it was truly a family place. During the day her three sons and her mother all came to visit at various points; Griselda’s eldest son, who is studying to be a nutritionist, even helps take samples and do computer work in the clinic.
Our next task was to find out about the other health clinics in the area. It turns out that there are three clinics similar to Griselda’s in Milpa Alta. We went to all three of these clinics to ask about their services, their medical resources, the prices that they charge, and more. We wanted to find out how Griselda’s clinic compared to the rest. First, we found that Griselda’s clinic offers all the same basic lab services as the other clinics but her’s charges equal or lower prices. All of the other clinics besides Griselda’s do own their own ultrasound machine, so we validated that not having one is putting her at a major disadvantage. If she does receive the ultrasound machine, she will still be charging equal or lower prices for the ultrasound services. One might ask why four different clinics are needed with ultrasound services in the same area. What we noticed, and later validated by speaking to Griselda and observing her patients, is that her clinic services the most rural clientele of Milpa Alta as opposed to richer ones that live near the city center. Griselda’s is the only clinic that has a “ventania”, or outlet, located higher up in the mountainous farming area from where it is difficult for people to reach the three other clinics. Griselda is dedicated to serving this portion of the population with good treatment and fair prices.
We are starting to narrow in on exactly what type of ultrasound machine we would like to help Griselda invest in. In the process we are both learning much more than we ever thought we would know about medical equipment! It turns out that the machine is fairly complicated – various tests require different types of transducers, and also, there is a huge difference in diagnosis between a gray-scale or color Doppler machine. We have to decide which studies are most important for Griselda’s clientele, which functional components will give her an advantage over her competition, and how she will price each study. Based on predicted future cash flows we can determine which type of machine will be a worthy investment. During the day, we even got to speak to two different ultrasonografists in Milpa Alta to gain a better understanding of the machine specs. We will be doing much more research on ultrasound in the coming days and are hoping to purchase the machine soon!
Griselda spent the day with us and we were able to converse with her at great length about her plans after receiving the ultrasound machine. This project is really interesting to both of us because it is essentially a mini-consulting project, which will ultimately benefit the health services of a small community. We have also designed a community survey to gauge the demands and health needs of the community at large, which we are hoping to distribute next week.
In the middle of the day we had a true Mexican meal of tomales (which we both love!), in the central mercado. Check out the pictures of the mercado! It is a very busy place throughout the day, especially at lunch time when everyone congregates to socialize and eat all kinds of delicious Mexican food.
