Liberia #26- Feb 1
I am called at midnight to see a patient that feels weak. There is a young man outside. I walk up to him and the people gathered around him. I ask who speaks Engish, and a number of them respond that they do. Well what is happened to him? “He feel week” What else? “He got malaria and typhoid”. The guy looks up at me, and I get the sense that he is putting it on. I am immediately very annoyed with him. OK, I don’t want diagnoses, I want symptoms! What are you feeling? What is hurting? They don’t respond. Either tell me what’s happening or go back home! “He feel week” The 22yo guy, stands up walks around then sits down again. He is obviously not terribly sick. I tell them to go home. “No, he sick” “he not think good. He got typhoid and malaria” what do you mean by he has typhoid and malaria? “ silence. I think of walking away, but stay a little longer. Headache? “his head can hurt him!” fever? “he no got fever” stomach running (diarrhea) “no he no running!!” vomit? “he no vomit” Eventually I find out that he has been a little off this evening and I ask what drugs or alcohol he’s taken. He is kind of acting high and irritable. They deny everything. Said this happened to him before when he had malaria. I seen plenty of cerebral malaria, and this is not what they act like. Though very annoyed with the whole situation, I decide at least he is not a risk for ebola, and admit him. I give the usual quinine and artemeter, to cover malaria, knowing that if he likely just slept, that he would be fine. Still suspecting drugs as the cause.
At 3 AM, Im called to see a woman who just came in pregnant and has vaginal bleeding. I find out she is at term, and bleeding a little. By the time I get in there, the midwife has had a chance to evaluate her and ask more questions. She had had a spot of blood. It is her first pregnancy, and she has not lost her water yet. She is only dilated 1cm. So she is many hours from delivery with good contractions. Since she isn’t bleeding at all, based on midwifes exam, I head back to bed. 7AM comes to early. My last day in ebola land!
I awake, to the alarm, get up, eat some breakfast, and have my personal devotions. I cannot wait to be back home with my wife! I go in at 8AM for the hospital devotional. There were two deaths last night. One an old guy with a stroke that had been worsening the last 4 days. The other a woman I admitted at about 8PM who had been sick for a week and unconscious for that last day. She had looked about ready to die when I admitted her. Apparently she haden’t even gotten the IV yet when she died. I’m not surprised.
I do rounds on the 36 patients, while Dr. Seton does administrative stuff she needs to get done. She will be the only doc taking care of all inpatients as soon as I leave, and continuous call. I do the dressing changes, and eventually make it back to my place to pack. I take my last bucket bath and get dressed in regular cloths.
So I’ve noted a few things that would improve life at Cooper for Dr. Seton, and many things that could help them provide better care. If you are interested in helping financially here are some things that need to be done.
-new air conditioner for Dr. Setons apartment
-new windows for Dr. Setons apartment- to keep dust and generator noise out, and keep cool in.
If you are interested in helping towards these please send your contribution to:
Summersville SDA Church
70 Friends R Fun Dr.
Summersville, WV 26651
Include a separate note that it is for Cooper Hospital and Dr. Seton
Other medical things are needed:
New mattresses
Windows throughout the hospital
handheld pulse oxymeters
handheld thermometers (surface temperature monitors)
more glucometer strips
a decent lab setup about $10,000 for CBC and chemistry machines and materials and reagents
X-ray machine that works and someone to develop pictures- if a digital system- then that isn’t necessary no developing would be necessary ?cost?
some new operating instruments- needle drivers, and scissors
Cidex to clean the endoscopy equipment.
impregnation tablets for the mosquito nets
a new autoclave
funds could be sent to either Summersville SDA church or to AHI below- designating what it was to be used for or general needs of Cooper Hospital: Sent to:
Adventist Health International
11060 Anderson St.
Loma Linda, CA 92350
Phone: (909) 558-4540
Fax: (909) 558-0242
Email: ahi@llu.edu
Can be done online through the Adventist health international website as well.
http://www.ahiglobal.org/Cooper/
for more mission stories visit our mission website www.missiondocs.org
for information on our missionary and christian workers oasis visit www.lifeimpactministries.net Safe Haven Oasis