Day 2

Day 2: Tuesday 8/7

 Minor Theatre procedure room.

People sleeping outside the casualty ward waiting for care.



It has only gotten crazier since yesterday. We left the compound at 8am and didn’t get to the hospital until about 9:30 because of an accident that turned us around. Once we arrived, Megan, Keisha, Trisha, Megan, and I all went to Maternity. Both Megan’s went up to the Millennium Wing to observe c-sections, while the rest of us hung out in labor and delivery. There seemed to be more patients than yesterday so it looked pretty promising. One woman was believed to have post-partum hemorrhaging because she had given birth to still born twins. While doing the examination they found an abnormal vaginal tear that they cleaned out with a pink bottle of just soap and water. It was probably one of the most painful looking tears I’ve ever seen. Two other women were dilated 8 cm and we were trying to guess which one would deliver first. The one woman ended up going into prolonged labor and was taken to minor theater for a c-section. The other had a very large baby so her labor was not progressing very much. We ended up leaving at 1 because we were tired of waiting around. I was so hungry; the food here is kind of odd at the compound. Every night it’s this meat stew stuff that you put on potatoes, a tortilla, or rice. It just depends on the night. Otherwise, we have to pack a sandwich for lunch but there isn’t a refrigerator to keep a cold meat sandwich in at the hospital so I just bring a Luna bar. Breakfast is either eggs or cereal with milk from a funny packet. After the hospital today we went to Café Mocha, my favorite place! Free wifi and the best cinnamon drycinno you could possibly want. After there we came back to the compound and took a nap for a couple hours because a few people planned on doing a night shift at the hospital.

9pm eight of us left for the hospital. Only minor theater for sutures and casualty (emergency room) are open at that time. Right away we were thrown into chaos. Alexa and I felt in the way as everyone else sutured a patient so we thought we would see if there was anything in casualty. We walked around the small room and saw a curtain shielding a woman who by the looks of the floor was bleeding quite a bit. When we opened the curtain we could tell she was hemorrhaging and had severe abdominal pain. I asked the family what happened and they said she had given birth to a 3 month old child not too long ago, and they thought the placenta was still inside. We felt the need to take action, even though there were probably 20 other people waiting to be seen. Alexa and I went and found Joel, a medical student in our program, and asked him to come look at her. He talked to her and examined her a little bit, but with hardly any equipment or supplies there is really nothing any of us can do. We wanted her to be moved to Ward 9 where it is quieter and she can be prepped for surgery, but the casualty nurse said there were no beds available. So we decided to go look for ourselves and there were plenty of beds. After about an hour of running around, being pushy with the staff, and ultimately just trying to get this poor woman some help—we found a surgeon. He was unavailable at the time, but successfully we got her moved upstairs to 9 and the next morning she had the surgery and was discharged. It sounds so basic, but in this hospital it’s close to a miracle. What I took away from this situation was to persevere. We knew what had to be done and with perseverance it was accomplished. It took harassing staff, making our own calls, and fighting for a woman who desperately needed care, but we made it happen because it was the right thing to do. Joel was fantastic; I learned a lot from him tonight.

Back in casualty, things were heating up again. A 3 month old baby girl came in with labored breathing with apparent signs of pneumonia. An elderly woman came in with similar symptoms so I immediately tried to find her a non-rebreather mask for oxygen. Nothing is easy to come by in the hospital so I had to have the nurse find one and hook it up for me. It wasn’t working so Mia and I picked the woman up and carried her to another bed. After things calmed down for a few minutes we stepped out to re-gather our thoughts for a minute. As we did that we noticed they were carrying out a 4 year old child with a white sheet over him. They were on the way to the morgue. While we were busy with all the other patients, he was one of the 20 patients waiting to be seen. The most frustrating thing about casualty is that the doctors and nurses stand behind the counter and don’t do anything. They are never in a rush to go anywhere or see patients. We found one nurse sleeping in a minor theater room on a patient table. It seems like the hospital is more of a place to die, than to get better. It’s very hard to find some positivity in a place like this, but it’s the only way you can get through it. Had we not been there the woman would have not made it up to placenta retention surgery. The elderly woman may have died because she did not receive oxygen.

I wish I had the knowledge and experience to do more, I think we all feel that way. But, at the end of the day we do anything and everything we can improve the outcome of the patients that come in here. We treat them fairly, talk to them like people, and provide the best care possible to the best of our ability.