Playing Pharmacist

Much frustration with this post. I had it all typed out with pictures and then turns out it never saved. Mer. This week there were two teams here doing medical and dental clincs.  On Wednesday morning I helped with dental, basically just organizing the papers, checking which kids were and weren't there and playing with the kids while their parents were getting their teeth checked.  After lunch I went with the other group to a village where we held the medical clinic.  I manned the "pharmacy," which was two tables of medicine and wound care materials.  They had two doctors and a nursing student and translators for each of them.  The nursing student was in charge of triage and then sent the patients to one of the two doctor stations.  A lot of the patients were older women that had pain in their joints which mostly came from wear and tear so we gave them some vitamins and ibuprofen.  We handed out a lot of child's tylenol as well.  By the end I got pretty good at guessing what medicine the doctor's needed based on their symptoms.  The other half of the team cleaned feet and passed out TOMs to the kids.

The pharmacy

Patients seeing the doctors

Picture by Rachel Yowell while she was passing out TOMs

When we got back, we had the second half of the soccer tournament that was started last week.  Nina, Emily, and I got there a little early but once the kids from the orphanage came down, we were bombarded and were surrounded by them.  During the second to last game it started pouring so we decided to embrace it and get soaked.  It was Emily and Steve's last night so before heading back we went to the bakery and bought at least Q120 worth of goodies.  We polished off a good bit of it with some coffee after having a late dinner at the rancho. 

Om nom nom

On Thursday we went to El Oasis, a village along railroad tracks.  It is probably one of the most unique things I've seen while here.  Instead of being in a gridlike pattern like most of the villages I've been to so far, the houses/huts in this one run in two lines parallel to the tracks.  They have built these carts to use the tracks to their advantage.  To carry big jugs of water from the well to their respective homes, they put the jugs on the carts and push them down.  When we arrived, a bunch of kids put all of our boxes and equipment on the carts and pushed them to where we were having the clinic.

This clinic wasn't as organized as the other one.  We were in an area with a dirt floor and a table that the doctors used to see their patients.  Our pharmacy was the boxes laid out on a 2x4 on cinderblocks.  We were still able to see plenty of patients though.  The most common problems were joint pain and a cough, which comes from the smoke that they breath in while coughing.

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The "pharmacy"

After lunch, we were supposed to set up a bunch of chairs in the new church but they hadn't arrived yet so we walked down the tracks and talked to and prayed with the families there.  A few of them hadn't gotten a chance to go to the clinic so eventually we put all of the boxes on a cart and turned it into a mobile clinic.  The chairs got there so we set them up and prayed over the church.  I also met the cutest little girl ever, Jacqueline.  She was absolutely precious.

Our little mobile pharmacy

Jacqueline

Friday saw more medical clinics, though a different one this time.  Rachel and I went with two doctors from Hope of Life, a few office people, and another team of doctors from the city to El Mitch, the village I was at for VBS on Tuesday.  In my room, we took heights and weights of the kids and then sent them to one of two clinics where they saw a doctor.  If they needed medicine, they could go to the pharmacy which was set up in another room.

Our room

For lunch we went to the house of one of the office guys.  They served us chow mein, so Guatemalan Chinese food.  It was probably the best thing I've eaten here.  We had frozen chocolate covered bananas.  We measured more kids in the afternoon and then headed back to HOL.  There was another cena tipica so lots of good food.

More noms

Please let me know if you have any questions about what I'm doing or Hope of Life or Guatemala or anything!  If there's anything else you want me to include, let me know that too!