Latest / Dorktales Storytime | Stories for Kids Who Love Big Adventures / Dr. Fe Del Mundo | Filipina Pediatrician, History Stories for Kids

Transcript

Dr. Fe Del Mundo | Filipina Pediatrician, History Stories for Kids · Dorktales Storytime | Stories for Kids Who Love Big Adventures

• 1:09
  Jonathan: Hello, Dork Squad.
• 1:11
  Jonathan: I'm Jonathan Cormur, and you're listening to Dorktales Storytime, the podcast for kids and their pop culture-loving grown-ups.
• 1:18
  Jonathan: And this is an inspiring story about a hidden hero of history.
• 1:23
  Theme Song: It's a beautiful day for a story, adventure, and glory, new friends and old ones too.
• 1:30
  Theme Song: It's an excellent day to get swept away in a tale, so let us regale you!
• 1:45
  Redge: Ah! No! I swear, if one more mosquito bites me on this hike, I will be contacting the Mosquito Council to have a serious discussion about respecting personal space and no biting in Once Upon a Time land.
• 2:05
  Jonathan: Well, look, we're at the bottom of the mountain now.
• 2:07
  Jonathan: Let's hang out in the valley for a bit and reapply some bug spray.
• 2:12
  Jonathan: I feel like just spraying it on should do the trick.
• 2:20
  Redge: If you say so.
• 2:21
  Taylor: Jonathan! Redge, cluck! Aren't you both like totally a sight for sore eyes?
• 2:27
  Jonathan: Oh, the Valley Hen, how's it going?
• 2:30
  Redge: Yes, hello, Taylor.
• 2:31
  Redge: How are you doing?
• 2:33
  Taylor: There's like no time for small talk.
• 2:35
  Taylor: The Octopops
• 2:36
  Jonathan: um Octopops?
• 2:39
  Redge: You don't know the Octopops, Jonathan?
• 2:42
  Redge: They're only Once Upon A Time's most famous K-pop octopus singing group.
• 2:48
  Jonathan: Uh sorry, can't say I do.
• 2:51
  Taylor: They're like positively dreamy, cluck.
• 2:54
  Taylor: But that's like not the point.
• 2:55
  Taylor: They have a performance tonight, and being the tailor that I am, I have to go hem the pants for each of the octopi before they get on stage.
• 3:03
  Taylor: Do you know how many legs that is?
• 3:06
  Redge: Hmm, let's see.
• 3:08
  Redge: An octopus has eight legs, and there are six members of Octopops, so eight, uh, sixteen, uh, twenty-four
• 3:17
  Taylor: It's like a lot of legs, cluck.
• 3:19
  Taylor: Anyway, my egg sitter just like totally flaked on me, and now I have no one to watch my eggs while I'm gone, cluck!
• 3:27
  Redge: Sounds like you're between an egg and a hard place.
• 3:30
  Redge: Get it?
• 3:32
  Redge: Egg and a hard place?
• 3:33
  Redge: I crack myself up.
• 3:36
  Redge: Crack! Eggs and cracking! Get it?
• 3:42
  Jonathan: Good one, Redge.
• 3:44
  Taylor: Please, oh please, Jonathan and Redge, can you please watch my eggs?
• 3:49
  Redge: Well, I don't know.
• 3:50
  Redge: I've never sat on eggs before.
• 3:53
  Taylor: Like, not to worry at all, my dude.
• 3:55
  Taylor: You don't have to sit on them.
• 3:56
  Taylor: I've got an incubator.
• 3:59
  Redge: An incubator?
• 4:01
  Jonathan: Oh, that's a machine that keeps the eggs warm and cozy while their mom is away.
• 4:05
  Redge: Oh, how clever.
• 4:07
  Redge: So no sitting on them?
• 4:10
  Taylor: No sitting on them at all.
• 4:12
  Taylor: So would you?
• 4:13
  Jonathan: We'd be happy to.
• 4:15
  Taylor: Oh, thank you, thank you.
• 4:17
  Taylor: The eggs are in that barn over there.
• 4:19
  Taylor: I'll be back quicker than you can say.
• 4:21
  Taylor: Totally tubular.
• 4:24
  Jonathan: No worries.
• 4:25
  Jonathan: See you soon.
• 4:26
  Jonathan: Come on, Redge, let's go watch some eggs.
• 4:34
  Redge: So that's an incubator.
• 4:37
  Jonathan: That's an incubator.
• 4:38
  Jonathan: Aww, look at the eggs.
• 4:40
  Jonathan: They're so cute and little.
• 4:42
  Redge: They're adorable.
• 4:43
  Redge: Okay.
• 4:45
  Redge: Now what?
• 4:46
  Redge: Do the eggs um do anything?
• 4:50
  Jonathan: Only if they hatch.
• 4:51
  Jonathan: Otherwise.
• 4:52
  Jonathan: Nope.
• 4:54
  Redge: Hatch?
• 4:54
  Redge: What are we going to do if they hatch?
• 4:56
  Redge: I'm too young to be a father.
• 4:59
  Jonathan: Take a deep breath, Redge.
• 5:01
  Jonathan: I'm sure they won't hatch in the short time Taylor is gone.
• 5:05
  Redge: So we just sit here and look at them?
• 5:09
  Jonathan: Pretty much.
• 5:11
  Redge: Well, we need to think of something to do in the meantime, or I'll die of boredom.
• 5:18
  Jonathan: I guess this incubator does remind me of someone.
• 5:22
  Redge: Yes! I smell a hidden hero of history story coming on.
• 5:26
  Redge: Hmm.
• 5:28
  Redge: Well, maybe that's the hay.
• 5:31
  Jonathan: Nope, you're right, it's a story.
• 5:33
  Jonathan: Today I'd like to tell you about the remarkable life of Dr.
• 5:36
  Jonathan: Fe Del Mundo.
• 5:39
  Redge: Doctor Fe Del Mundo What a fabulous name.
• 5:44
  Jonathan: If you translate it to English, it means faith of the world, and doctor Del Mundo did bring a lot of faith to the world.
• 5:52
  Redge: How is that?
• 5:54
  Jonathan: She was a woman at the forefront of pediatrics.
• 5:57
  Redge: Oh incredible! And we all know that pediatrics is
• 6:04
  Jonathan: it's the branch of medicine that focuses on babies and children.
• 6:08
  Redge: Yes, yes, of course.
• 6:09
  Redge: I knew that.
• 6:10
  Redge: How did she get into pediatrics?
• 6:13
  Jonathan: To quote the sound of music, let's start at the very beginning.
• 6:18
  Redge: A very good place to start, yes.
• 6:20
  Jonathan: Fe Del Mundo was born in the city of Intramoros in a country called the Philippines on november twenty seventh, nineteen eleven.
• 6:29
  Redge: A long time ago.
• 6:31
  Jonathan: Absolutely.
• 6:31
  Jonathan: Fe was the sixth of eight children to Bernardo and Paz Del Mundo.
• 6:37
  Redge: That's a whole lot of children.
• 6:39
  Jonathan: But medicine just wasn't as advanced as it is today, which means that Fe experienced the loss of four of her siblings, including her older sister Elena.
• 6:49
  Redge: That's just awful.
• 6:51
  Jonathan: Yeah, and it really impacted Fe, as you can imagine.
• 6:55
  Jonathan: She found Elena's diary where Elena wrote about her dreams of becoming a doctor.
• 7:00
  Jonathan: From then on, she swore she would follow her sister's goal and become a doctor herself.
• 7:06
  Redge: That's a wonderful way to honor your sister's life.
• 7:10
  Redge: How'd she become a doctor though?
• 7:12
  Jonathan: At the very young age of fifteen, Fe enrolled at the University of Philippines College of Medicine in Manila.
• 7:20
  Jonathan: By nineteen thirty three, she graduated as the class's valedictorian.
• 7:25
  Redge: Whoa.
• 7:26
  Redge: That must mean something important.
• 7:29
  Redge: That means she had the highest grades of her class.
• 7:33
  Jonathan: Incredible! You're not the only one who thought it was incredible.
• 7:37
  Jonathan: Her wits got the attention of the president of the Philippines, Manuel Quezon, who offered her a scholarship to study in the United States.
• 7:47
  Redge: That's where you're from, isn't that right, Jonathan?
• 7:50
  Jonathan: That's right.
• 7:50
  Jonathan: But America was quite different then, especially when it came to education.
• 7:55
  Jonathan: There were a lot of colleges that didn't admit women.
• 8:00
  Redge: Knowing what I know about the other hidden heroes, that probably didn't stop doctor Del Mundo.
• 8:06
  Jonathan: That's a good hunch, Redge.
• 8:07
  Jonathan: In nineteen thirty six, Fe was admitted to Harvard University, one of the top schools in the US.
• 8:14
  Jonathan: She was not only the first woman, she was also the first Filipino and the first person of an Asian background to study there.
• 8:23
  Redge: Go, Fe, go Jonathan, did you see that?
• 8:28
  Redge: One of the eggs twitched.
• 8:30
  Jonathan: Are you sure?
• 8:31
  Jonathan: I didn't see anything.
• 8:34
  Redge: Maybe I'm imagining things.
• 8:35
  Redge: Anyway, go on.
• 8:38
  Jonathan: Where was I?
• 8:39
  Redge: Harvard.
• 8:40
  Jonathan: Oh, that's right.
• 8:41
  Jonathan: Growing up around siblings that were dealing with illnesses as children, Fe started to focus on children's health, particularly malnutrition.
• 8:51
  Redge: And malnutrition is
• 8:54
  Jonathan: that's when your body doesn't get the right amount of nutrition to help you grow.
• 8:58
  Jonathan: It happens a lot when children don't have access to healthy foods.
• 9:02
  Jonathan: But her research in the United States didn't stop there.
• 9:05
  Jonathan: She led studies on diseases that were so serious for children in the Philippines at the time, like dengue fever, polio, and measles.
• 9:13
  Jonathan: Her work would later help to establish the foundation for vaccine programs in the Philippines.
• 9:20
  Redge: Vaccines?
• 9:21
  Redge: That's like when I got my flu shot last month.
• 9:24
  Jonathan: Exactly, Redge.
• 9:24
  Jonathan: It's usually just a shot that helps to prevent you and other people from getting sick.
• 9:29
  Redge: Did she stay in the United States forever?
• 9:32
  Jonathan: Great question.
• 9:33
  Jonathan: After graduating from Harvard, she made the decision to go back to her home in the Philippines.
• 9:39
  Jonathan: She felt she could have the biggest impact there.
• 9:42
  Jonathan: But it was 1941.
• 9:45
  Redge: What happened in 1941?
• 9:47
  Jonathan: That's when that big war, the one we call World War II, broke out.
• 9:52
  Jonathan: During the war, places called internment camps were set up in the Philippines, where people who weren't born in the Philippines and who were considered enemies were placed.
• 10:02
  Redge: I've learned a lot about internment camps from other heroes' stories you've told me before, and they sound terrible and unfair.
• 10:10
  Jonathan: They were Redge.
• 10:12
  Jonathan: One camp was at the University of Santo Tomas in Manila, and Fe decided to use her medical knowledge to take care of the children who were sent there.
• 10:21
  Jonathan: She volunteered to be part of the International Red Cross.
• 10:25
  Redge: It seems like all of Dr.
• 10:27
  Redge: Del Mundo's choices came from a place of wanting to help others.
• 10:32
  Jonathan: That's a great way to describe her actions, Redge.
• 10:34
  Jonathan: She was very much a selfless person, so much so that they started to call her the Angel of Santo Tomas.
• 10:42
  Redge: A well deserved title.
• 10:44
  Redge: What did she do next?
• 10:46
  Redge: After two years there, she moved to North General Hospital in Cebu City, where she became the director and the first Filipino woman to lead a government hospital.
• 10:57
  Redge: She was the first at a lot of things.
• 11:00
  Jonathan: Somebody has to be, and it takes a lot of courage to do something others have never done before.
• 11:06
  Redge: Did she keep paving the way?
• 11:08
  Jonathan: Of course.
• 11:09
  Jonathan: In nineteen fifty seven, she opened the very first pediatric hospital in the Philippines.
• 11:15
  Jonathan: That's a hospital for children.
• 11:17
  Redge: Whoa.
• 11:18
  Jonathan: Whoa is right.
• 11:19
  Jonathan: And she didn't do it without sacrifice.
• 11:22
  Jonathan: She sold everything she owned, including her house.
• 11:25
  Jonathan: She took out a loan from the government and received donations from other people just so she could open it.
• 11:32
  Redge: She believed in it that much.
• 11:34
  Jonathan: She knew it was necessary to save the lives of children.
• 11:37
  Jonathan: Kids would come to the hospital who had illnesses like her sister Elena.
• 11:41
  Jonathan: Elena had abdominal and stomach issues.
• 11:45
  Jonathan: This was a pretty normal thing that can happen, but back then it could lead to something more serious, and other doctors weren't focusing on kids' health.
• 11:54
  Redge: But not Dr.
• 11:55
  Redge: Del Mundo.
• 11:56
  Jonathan: Nope.
• 11:57
  Jonathan: That's when she invented the BRAT diet.
• 12:01
  Redge: What did you just call me?
• 12:02
  Jonathan: Not you, Redge.
• 12:04
  Jonathan: The BRAT Diet.
• 12:06
  Jonathan: It stands for banana, rice, applesauce, and toast.
• 12:11
  Redge: Mmm, sounds scrumptious.
• 12:13
  Jonathan: Delicious and it helped with hydrating the body.
• 12:17
  Jonathan: So if a child was sick and they stuck to the BRAT diet, they could start to feel healthy again.
• 12:23
  Redge: Pretty simple.
• 12:24
  Jonathan: Simple and effective.
• 12:26
  Jonathan: But her work didn't stop there.
• 12:28
  Redge: Did Dr.
• 12:29
  Redge: Del Mundo ever sleep?
• 12:32
  Jonathan: I don't know about her sleep schedule, but she did stay busy.
• 12:36
  Jonathan: While her hospital was in a city, she had a passion for bringing medical care to children in more rural areas.
• 12:44
  Redge: Those are towns and villages that have less people.
• 12:47
  Jonathan: That's right.
• 12:48
  Jonathan: And tend to have less access to health care.
• 12:51
  Jonathan: She was particularly interested in babies who were born too early, otherwise known as premature.
• 12:58
  Jonathan: And that brings us to why I wanted to talk about her today.
• 13:02
  Redge: What do you mean?
• 13:04
  Jonathan: Well, premature babies have to fight harder to survive than babies who were born on time.
• 13:10
  Jonathan: Premature babies in larger cities were placed in incubators.
• 13:15
  Redge: Like this one right here?
• 13:18
  Jonathan: Well, not exactly this incubator for eggs, but similar.
• 13:21
  Jonathan: The incubator helped the baby grow so it could develop the way another baby would.
• 13:27
  Jonathan: But in rural areas, they didn't have electricity, and incubators required electricity to work.
• 13:34
  Redge: So how did doctor Del Mundo solve that problem?
• 13:38
  Jonathan: She invented an incubator that didn't require any electricity.
• 13:43
  Redge: How'd she do that?
• 13:45
  Jonathan: She used the materials available to her, two baskets made of bamboo where the baby would be placed, cloth, which she used as a scale to monitor the baby's weight, hot water bottles to regulate the baby's temperature, and a hood to provide oxygen.
• 14:02
  Redge: Well, did it work?
• 14:04
  Jonathan: It did.
• 14:05
  Jonathan: This invention saved countless lives.
• 14:08
  Redge: A true pioneering doctor superhero!
• 14:13
  Jonathan: In nineteen seventy nine, she was the first female to be named the National Scientist of the Philippines.
• 14:19
  Jonathan: Still, she didn't stop there.
• 14:21
  Jonathan: She continued working well into her nineties.
• 14:25
  Redge: Holy cannoli!
• 14:30
  Jonathan: Okay, I definitely heard that.
• 14:33
  Redge: The eggs, Jonathan! They're starting to crack! Does that mean?
• 14:41
  Taylor: cluck! Like, thanks so much for watching the eggs.
• 14:45
  Taylor: The octopop said hello.
• 14:47
  Jonathan: Taylor, look, your eggs!
• 14:49
  Redge: They're hatching!
• 14:51
  Taylor: What?
• 14:51
  Taylor: You're like totally kidding! Oh my gosh! You're like totally not my babies!
• 15:02
  Jonathan: Congratulations, Mom!
• 15:05
  Taylor: Thank you so much, Jonathan and Redge! You're like the best egg sitters ever!
• 15:12
  Redge: Totally! Now, did you happen to get autographs from the Octopops?
• 15:19
  Jonathan: This has been a Jon in Character production.
• 15:21
  Jonathan: This Hidden Hero of History story was written by Rebecca Cunningham, edited and produced by Molly Murphy, and performed by Jonathan Cormur.
• 15:29
  Jonathan: Sound recording in production by Jermaine Hamilton at Pacific Grove Soundworks.
• 15:34
  Jonathan: We love hearing from you.
• 15:36
  Jonathan: Contact us at Dorktalesstorytime at gmail.com or try our one-way text feature as a safe way to reach out.
• 15:44
  Jonathan: You can find even more ways to reach us in the show notes.
• 15:48
  Jonathan: Now, go be the hero of your own story, and we'll see you next once upon a time.
• 15:54
  Theme Song: So gather your squad for all to see that imagined.
• 16:03
  Theme Song: This is where the unexpected happens.
• 16:09
  Theme Song: Join our humble hosts and hit the trails of a wonderful, wacky wild world of dork tales.