Day11,12,13,14

So my internet has been crappy... and I have been lazy so I am clumping 4 days of fun together! 

Thursday and Friday were a bit rough emotionally .  Remeber my patient I wrote about on Wednesday who I told needed an amputation. We sent him for tests and it turns out he is HIV +. This is not a huge deal In the USA because there are medications that can successfully slow the disease and in some cases cure it. In Haiti there are no drugs ( even if there were this patient could not afford them). His HIV will progress to AIDS and it will kill him. Probably within the next few years. His is the first time in all my trips I felt useless and very limited by what I could offer a patient. I did talk to him about the disease and how it can impact his life and how to avoid spreading it to others, but that is only the tip of what needs to be done. We were able to give him an IV of b complex and saline as well as theee good meals and a ton of vitamins.  He reported that he felt better, which made me feel better. I know this is only short lived though. Hopefully he will be able to get the amputation so his risk of infection significantly decreases. 

The rest of my patients are faring significantly better ( thankfully!) . Ther are a lot of healing wounds. I also found out there is a full time free clinic for wounds year round about an hour from where we are. Most of my patients say they cannot afford the taxi ride there, but that is an option for some people. Between Thursday and Friday I loaded all my patients up with goodies to take home so they can do their wound care at home. 

For the past two weeks I have had a great little wound care team. There were two younger people who were thinking of applying to PT school and roamed around helping where people needed help. The second week the girls were super into the wound care and helped me out a ton! It made things way smoother and faster! Yea for budding wound care PTs!!!!!

Thursday night was another fantastic salsa night! There are a few dancers on the team this week so we danced way more than we usually do. I even got to do a tango!( although it was an Argentine tango which is different from the tango I know). I am still very intrigued by how tango fits into the Haitian dance culture. They either do a mix of tango and salsa or tango and merengue. Both are fun to watch and do , but I never know when the music is going to dance and I am always tripping over my feet!

Friday was pack the clinic up and keep everything dry day. We got a massive rainstorm right as clinic was ending. Our porch was totally flooded! Luckily it only lasted about 30 minutes, but things got rather wet!

Saturday we woke up bright and early (330 am!) to hop on the bus back to PaP. The drive was ... interesting :). The road was a bit washed out in spots to people were throwing rocks in the roads. I did not think our bus was going to make it but we did  . The bus behind us turned over though. Everyone was fine, but it took a long time to flip the truck back over!# Haitidrivingadventures. We finally made it to our hotel where we enjoyed  some American style food and relaxing by a pool. We also got a hot shower and AC!

Sunday I got picked up by the st. Boniface car and headed south to the mountains. We had to make a few pit stops along the way and there was a ton of traffic, but we made it to the hospital in about 4 hours. 

Let's talk about traffic . OMG!!! I though Boston traffic was bad and Boston drivers were aggressive. It is 1000000000s  times worse here. People weave in and out, pass on whatever sode of the road they want and play chicken wth each other all the time. I am not surprised. That we see so many Moto accidents!

The mountains here are lush and green and cool (89 degrees!). They seem to grow a lot more veggies here based on what I can see from the drive and what people are selling. This area also looks like there is a bit more money to go around. The home are mostly well built cement homes  and there are electrical wires overheard indicating to me that there is pretty consistent electricity. I also see a lot of water treatment plants ( or st least this is what the driver told me). 

The hospital is well set up. There is a surgical, maternal and medical ward all connected to and ED. There is also an SCI unit and gyms as well as dorms for the patients to stay in across from the other part of the hospital. I will get a full tour tomorrow, but it seems very well run. I am told it is a free hospital so people come from all over for surgeries. 

I ant wait to get started tomorrow!

Wound care team!

People fixing the road

Sunrise over St. B