Karim Alomar

I volunteered on the administration and logistics department for the King Salman Humanitarian Aid & Relief Center team that traveled out to Banjul, Gambia.

Much like PAC, KSHARC aims to provide medical aid and relief to areas that are in need.

Roles:

• Communicating with and aiding patients
• Guiding patients & letting them know when it was time for their operation
• Bringing physicians required items (medical caps and gowns, medicine, drains, IV fluid bags, catheters, etc.)
• Helping foster a warm and collaborative environment between local and team physicians
• Attending to and assisting the physicians after work hours (making sure everyone is happy and fed, hotel rooms are cared for, etc.)

One working week was spent in Banjul.

This trip served as both a teaching point and as a reminder. It taught and reinforced communication, time management, decision making, initiative, and collaborative skills.

It served as a reminder that once again, we are blessed so much more than we realize. It is a blessing to be where I am today, and no matter how bad I might think things might get, things are infinitely better than they could have been.

• Shared resources, opportunities, and activities to support mentee's learning and development.
• Shared information about student life, academic offerings and healthy decision making with peer mentees.
• Supported younger peers through one-on-one sessions, determining aspirations, setting goals and working through challenges.
• Attended and led meetings with other peer mentors to offer support and standardize resource offerings.
• Worked with peers speaking English as second language, supporting individual progress despite unique barriers.
• Established trusting relationship with mentees by maintaining professionalism and honoring confidentiality.
• Promoted positive behavior and responsibility among mentees by modeling appropriate social skills.
• Implemented strategies to help mentees manage stress and difficult emotions.
• Encouraged mentees to develop strong decision-making and problem-solving skills.
• Helped students develop organizational, time management and study skills.
• Provided resources to support students in achieving career goals.
• Assisted students in exploring and selecting career paths.
• Educated students on college admissions process and scholarship requirements.
• Oversaw career and job fairs to connect students with area schools and employers.
• Facilitated peer-to-peer conversations to support open communication among mentees.
• Developed mentees' life skills such as time management and communication.
• Collaborated with school counselors, teachers and administrators to aid mentee success.

I volunteered on the administration and logistics department for the PAC team that traveled out to Kano, Nigeria.
For context, the PAC organization travels out to cities where medical care is scarce to provide the less fortunate with much needed medical care.

My job included many roles, including, but not limited to:

• Maintaining records of all performed surgeries on a daily basis
• Communicating with and aiding patients
• Bringing physicians required items (medicine, drains, IV fluid bags, catheters, etc.)
• Documenting certain operations, noting down things such as: patient info, operation type, date, and names of operating surgeons
• Performing interviews with operating physicians
• Attending to and assisting the physicians after work hours (making sure everyone is happy and fed, hotel rooms are cared for, etc.)
• Being the bridge between the PAC team and the local physicians (communicating between them, sending messages from each side)
• Walking long distances between different parts of the hospital to carry out various duties for the physicians

One working week was spent in Kano, where we did all of our work.

This trip helped me learn, develop, and grow as a person. It helped me develop my communication, decision making, and time management skills.

I also learned to work with others more efficiently. I found that I had more experience working under considerable amounts of pressure.

The trip was also enlightening. It showed me just how blessed I am, and how much the less fortunate needlessly suffer.
I am grateful for having the opportunity to do good things for those in need, and at no cost, as should be the case everywhere.

I again came to volunteer at KFSHRC in 2019, where I became part of a team that worked to make the lives of patients coming to the hospital easier.

My job was to do the following:

• Guide patients/visitors around the hospital (as it is very large)
• Assisting the elderly (pushing them around in wheel chairs, carrying their luggage, etc.)
• Answering any questions that a patient/visitor might have
• Aiding patients/visitors in whatever they require to the best of my ability/capacity as a volunteer

I volunteered for a total of 85 hours across two months, where I further solidified my communication skills, this time with many strangers whose names I will never know.

I also improved upon my team-working skills, as I had to work alongside my colleagues to improve the experience of the hospital visitors.

I volunteered at King Faisal Specialist Hospital many years ago, aiding researchers in work related to various animals, such as: rodents like mice and rats, and larger animals, such as sheep and baboons.

My work included the following:

• Changing mouse and rat cages, which included: Moving the animals from their old cages to their new ones, filling the cages with food and water, and performing final checks to confirm everything is as it should be.
• Sterilizing old cages
• Shadowing doctors performing operations on the various creatures named above
• Learning about different topics and skills about laboratory animals (Cage changing and sterilization, laboratory animal wellbeing and their use in biomedical research, proper animal handling, and rodent anesthesia and analgesia)

I worked for a total of 5 months across two years (July-September 2017, June-August 2018).
This opportunity allowed me to develop my communication skills with my superiors at a relatively early age, as well as allowing me to actually "be out on the field" doing necessary work that is required of me.