Overdue

An update is long overdue. I have put it on my "to do" list every weekend for the past 3 months. Something else always comes up. And the few times I have sat down to think of what to type, I become internally conflicted about what to write about. I often want to write about work...since I am at a hospital about 80 hours a week (or more if there are sick patients). But the blog is public, so I have worried about colleagues or patients or their families making assumptions...possibly even false assumptions about my posts.  For example: writing about deaths, or complicated cases, or even something a colleague did that made my week harder....would be difficult in a public forum.  So, what has happened? I have not updated the blog. But not for having a lack of potentially interesting stories and pictures!

It's on the "to do" list for this weekend again. Since April's posts many things have happened. We have actually had a 1-bed ICU functioning since September 1st and officially seen 17+ patients, but the ICU nurses have taken care of many sick patients in the ER and wards (when the patient doesn't qualify for ICU or can't afford it...but are still quite sick). We are now ready to run a 2-bed ICU in the new ICU building (though there are some things that have to be completed before I can throw the "official opening" party). My mother and cousin Carol came for a visit and we took a week from our annual leave time to go take them to Lake Malawi and to South Luangwa Park in Zambia. And we have gone to the South Africa Heart Congress in East London, South Africa. The hospital is creating it's strategic plan for the next 5 years and we hope to expand both our in-patient and out-patient facilities over that amount of time! We are very close to being able to do stress testing and holter monitoring in the cardiology clinic. And, there are several volunteers who want to come, and we look forward to the help! Dr. Saunders should be arriving early next year and is an Infectious Disease specialist, which will be a great addition to our current team! We really do need a nephrologist though. If anyone knows of a nephrologist willing to come to Africa for 6 months, 1 year, 2 years, 5 years....please let us know! It is going to be essential for running the ICU. Many of our severe malaria, severe AIDS, and sepsis patients have acute renal failure and we have no dialysis. There are actually only 2 dialysis units in the entire country (1 private, 1 public) with 2 machines each.....with a population of 14 million people! Please, all nephrologists out there: consider some humanitarian work here in Malawi at Blantyre Adventist Hospital!!

Also, we are planning our first trip back to the US after moving here for 7 weeks in February and March 2012. I have been convinced to work in order to keep up my skills in the US, but will still take 3 weeks of true vacation time!

Will add more stories and pictures eventually....