Sunday, May 16, 2010

Surgery Girls are Alive and Well






Our Surgery Girls live in the Ritz. They set up their tent like a hotel room and they keep it so neat. Kathleen is our next guest blogger. She agreed to share this letter to her family.

"How I miss you all. Haiti overwhelms all of your senses. All day long you smell diesel to run the generators. Here at the hospital there is music playing from dawn to dusk. The singing is in french & I am guessing it is hymns. The are Mosquitoes, but the repellent seems to control them. At any given time there are several teams from all over working here. Today an team from Vancouver Washington are leaving. They are doing a blog. Go to allengabrielmd.com and you may see some pictures of Lin & I working in the OR. About the OR: IT IS A PIT. It is not clean, with exposed wires, bad light, non working monitors. We do surgery with only a pulse ox and blood pressure. It is disorganized, outdated with useless junk everywhere. There is a guy that is glued to my side and won't let me throw any thing away. I have to be sneaky. Then we have to deal with the flies and occasional lizard in the operating room. I ignore the lizard. If a fly lands on the sterile field they just cover that spot with a sterile towel. We have young Haitian men who work in the OR. they are great with the electric fly swatter. This is a skill I've yet to acquire. So far I haven't hit one fly.

At first we set our tent on the roof. It was smelly & hot. Then came the horrible thunder storm in the middle of the night. I felt totally exposed but we stayed dry. I could feel the tent start to float. The next day we were able to move to a covered open area. The problem with this is that it is even hotter than the roof with little air movement. Well forget that. You know how money solves all problems (at least this one). I paid one of our helpers in the OR to get me a fan. Of course that price kept going up. But I didn't care. I was desperate. Now fan keeps disappearing. I have to go around the hospital to find it. I told my helper the fan is for us or sick babies ONLY! Now the fan has stayed put. The patients are mostly in the hallway on cots. Their families have to supply pillows, sheets, and food beyond the one meal a day the hospital supplies. I was told by the previous team member when you take a patient to the floor (there. Is no recovery) make sure they are breathing-duh-, can open there eyes & that there is a family member to take care of them.

There is hotel about 5 minutes away by Tap Tap. A Tap Tap is a pickup with a raised camper shell & benches on each side. They pack as many people in as they they can. They are totally dangerous but they get the job done. Anyway we've gone there three times. The food is not great, service is very slow but the Presidente Beer is great. And I don't even like beer. Well I better get going for the AM."

The pictures are of Kathleen in her scrubs, she was the circulator for the birth of twin girls, Lin was second scrub. The first twin was the small one being born in the picture. The mother asked Kathleen for a name that would go with Carla, she said how about Cara, and the mom named her Cara.

Enoch is one of the best translators and a wonderful man. He was Charlie's dedicated translator for the whole week, they worked hard together and made a strong bond. Today Enoch brought us about 20 pounds of local bananas as a gift, they are all gone. I arranged a transfer today of our tiny premie baby to the Doctors Without Borders pediatric hospital. We were trying to make it through with him on two IV antibiotics, but he spiked a fever again last night, he looked good but I couldn't take the worry. He needed a pediatrician. Sheila spent some time holding him today. I discharged so many babies today that the nursery looks empty. Walking back to our compound I had this fantasy that a team of many hands would come over to the nursery tonight and clean the cribs and furniture, which has not been done for a long time. I have germ fear every time we discharge a baby and a new baby moves into the same crib without cleaning. I just mentioned it to Mikell and she inspired the many hands. We went through the whole nursery in less than 30 minutes. Awesome! We were just informed that a Pediatrician and ER Doc are coming tomorrow for 2 weeks!!!! Emily you have been saved. An answer to my prayers. Things are good.

My friend Jeff added a place in the upper right corner of this blog if you would like to receive the blog automatically when I post. I also found the harrowing picture of the ambulance transport of the baby in respiratory distress, scroll down to see it (Leanna, Charlie and Tami with the baby).

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