Living dangerously in the kitchen (the kero stove is for all Anne's cooking!)!!


Sunday 4th July

This week just seems to have flown by - there has been a lot more rain, so internet connection has not been good, hence the gaps in my postings to Ian.

At the hospital things are busy; one day last week there were 160 patients seen in the outpatient clinic in the morning. Amongst them all, was a small boy that died of malaria before he was seen by a Dr. His parents (local) had taken four days before they brought him, trying other medications first. His mother was so distressed, she was just throwing herself in the dirt, rolling and screaming.

Death here is never a silent affair. Crowds gather and other women join the wailing, giving the mother support and perhaps ‘permission’ to grieve. The father, sobbing, carried the child in his arms out of the hospital, the same way he had arrived a few hours earlier. The boy would have been buried the next day in or around his family compound.

There is no A&E department, or triage, so it is hard to assess each and everyone’s condition immediately, they just sit en masse and wait. Most parents would have pushed and insisted to be seen, but it did not happen in this case, very sad.

Each morning Pauline or I have the most junior nurses for one hour to try and teach them the basics of nursing. A ‘background’ course in helping others, communication, ethics, understanding your patients, supporting your fellow nurses.

There are six nurses who attend, but on Wednesday only 5 arrived; I questioned the others to see where he might be - no response, no one had seen him. Later in the day, we hear he is in prison (quite common here) - reason –‘stealing cows’. So we are really succeeding in changing their thought patterns.....!

Most disputes are regarding cows, not enough have been paid for a wife, too many being asked for a wife, a certain number to pay off a bribe, pay a fine, anything really will, in the end, involve cows. Let’s hope he is back next week and we will re-give the lesson on communication skills……………