THE TEAM ! |
Laurel spoke to a group of doctors at the St Josephs Hospital and then later to some clinical officers and doctors who work in the community in medical clinics. This little group gathered in our house and it was really good to see them sharing together .WE were able to identify in the community some impediments to delivery of best medical practice and talked about some solutions which might help people receive better pain relief and management of end of life symptoms, assisting people to die in dignity.
On the medical front, Andrew has been sitting in with the clinical officers at Bregma , observing, giving feedback and mentoring . We saw a lady with Diabetes today who is on medication but has no blood glucose monitoring available and many of the tests we do in Australia to check on control are not available here, so it is a matter of modifying many of the protocols we use back home to this particular place.
Malcolm today was able to help Lois Ford raise her used shipping container off the ground to stop the termites eating the floor away. A local mechanic, Samuel was able to help, providing a car jack and other assistance.
The generator Malcolm helped repair at Bregma is working well . Power is off 50% of the time and having a generator means the XRay machine can be used. Solar Power keeps the other parts of the clinic going.
Anne spent this morning at Bregma talking to staff and patients and just listening to their stories. Many of the stories involve suffering and loss and hardship. It is quite humbling and overwhelming.
Shirley is spending a considerable amount of time in the YOTKOM office, at the back of the drug shop, sifting through receipts and invoices and using MYOB to get the bookwork for the drug shop and the yotkom project up todate. This is a great help to us in improving transparency and accountability within the Yotkom Project. Things will be set in place which will be ongoing.
Shirley slugs it out in Yotkom office with a packed lunch! |
Today,Andrew sat down with Lucy, the Bregma practice manager and looked at the last few months expenses, income and profit and loss for this important Primary Health Clinic. There are very many challenges to the successful operation of a private medical practice in this setting. Every day brings new set backs, disappointments, frustrations and unexpected black holes! Despite this, the medical practice overseen by Dr vincent is continuing to operate and deliver good health care. Without the boost given by Yotkom in the way of clinical officer salaries and capital input this clinic may not have been able to continue running. Dr Vincent may well have chosen to leave town and he is a great asset to this community.
Most of the Kitgum community regard the Yotkom sponsored Bregma Clinic as the best in the town and vote with their feet. WE can see some visible improvements since our last visit.
Laurel, Lynnette and Hannah left at 730am on the homeland bus this morning to make the arduous journey to Kampala. It took them 4 hours to make the first 100km due to a truck being bogged and needing to be dug out of the mud. We are going to miss them.
Yesterday Andrew and Anne went to out to the village to visit Cyclops, one of the laboratory technicians who was working at Bregma. Recently he had been so depressed he took an overdose of diabetic tablets and BP tablets, resulting in a severe low blood sugar and low Blood pressure. It took some hours for him to be brought to medical help and by then he was having seizures and sustained permanent brain damage. He has been discharged from hospital but is unable to speak more than a couple of words. There has been some slow improvement. Please pray for his continued healing and for the pastoral care needs of our Yotkom team and the patients who visit the clinic. We are looking at some ideas to address this issue.