Saturday March 21, 2009

I am writing this off and on as I get some time this Sunday. This was an interesting day. At the start, Katie had bandaged a young man’s foot and elbow and sent him on to pharmacy. By the time we filled his order, he had managed to seat enough that the bandage on his elbow was coming loose. One of my interpreters, Belony, tried to help him and was going out the door with a roll of duct tape. I inquired what was going on and soon found myself binding the elbow with a roll of coban. It is all a part of our full service pharmacy here in Haiti. We are seeing several police at this clinic and they are bringing their families in to be treated. Many of them speak good English. Papa Dick and I have a meeting early some morning with a person who runs an orphanage here in the area and has given us supplies in the past. That should be interesting.
I got in trouble yesterday with my water gun by chasing Diedudone though where Dr Jo was trying to treat a wound. I am also in trouble as I have managed to break the pharmacy sink drain basket. The very small screw that holds it together finally rusted through so you need to be creative to get a sink full of water for cleaning up the pharmacy tools.
Our evening at the Cyvadier Plaz (notice that I have corrected the spelling now that I re-read the hotel’s signs) was a great time. The food was excellent and almost every one got what they ordered. The owner was very helpful and attentive. He set up a tab for each of us so that we would not have to bother the bar staff with change. I had taken a photo copy of the drink prices and translated the costs into US dollars. I had failed to add the tax and gratuity so he redid my list and everyone had a better idea of how much they were spending on drinks. He had engaged a band so we had even more fun dancing and laughing. BTW, my legs are sore-sometimes I am not to smart. We finished the evening on the roof gazing at the stars. That keeps the noise further away from Dick and Barb. This team is doing its best to wear our hosts out.
Here are about patient numbers to this point: Tuesday 245, Wednesday 271, Thursday 205, Friday 256, and Saturday 192.
I am posting a link to some of the pictures from team members: http://picasaweb.google.com/edmonroe316 I hope that you enjoy them. I wish that I had taken the time to label them with more information. Marlena is writing a blog for FOTCOH each day and you can access it through the FOTCOH webpage (www.fotcoh.org). Marlena is writing from more of medical perspective as she has floated from being a provider, to helping me in the pharmacy, to triage etc. She is a great multi tasker.
Someone needs to use this computer so I’ll close.