Life in the African bush
Well this is the end of a busy week. Major and Dr. Zimudzi went off to South Africa to pick up Lori, a nurse who is joining our work for at least the next 2 years! She arrives in Joberg on Tuesday morning. My visitor, Charolette is being dropped off in Bulawayo this evening to spend a few days with friends while the guys go on to SA. she was born and grew up in Bulawayo so she is going home!
This has been a busy week with Wednesday having a staff inservice with our nurses and talking about a patient who got mismanaged in labor. This patient was complete for 5 hours and no one notified the doctor or myself until the baby came out flat and needed to be revived and eventually died within 24 hours. We used this as a "learning experience" to talk about what to do and what is normal when a woman gets to complete. Everyone said the understood! That evening just as I went to do some Lumbar Punctures on the wards, I noticed an OB chart at the nurses desk showing a patient had been complete at 930 a.m. and no further charting. When I asked why the chart was there someone said "oh actually she is not delivered!" I screamed what and went running off to the labor ward. It was now almost 4:30 p.m. and I quickly pulled the baby out with a vacumn extractor and laid into every nurse on that shift and sent for the ones that went home. Luckily the baby was strong and came out screaming! Now both of us were screaming--I am not sure who was louder! So much for understanding the in-service! The answer I got when I asked why they didn't notify someone, was that at 930 they notified the doctor who checked her, ruptured her membranes and told them "she will deliver, don't worry!" So they didn't worry and they were waiting for her to deliver! No charting from 930 a.m. on, no fetal heart, no descent of the head, no contrations because the doctor said she would deliver! I went home with a strong headache that night!
To top it off that afternoon Major got back from 2 days in Harare where he went to get the car serviced in preparation for the trip to SA. when he got on the dirt road he noticed something like diesel flicking up on the back window. When he stopped to check it he couldn't see anything dripping so he came the rest of the way. He got home and had the guys put the car over the pit and surprise--the found they had not put in one of the plugs in where they had drained out the diff oil in and didn't refill it! Amazing that he got here without the engine seizing--a true miracle to drive 350 kms without oil in the diff! He called the garage the next morning ( the main Toyota delaership in Harare) and had them shaking in their boots before he finished with our service rep! They kept asking if the engine was ok! He had them drive out immediately with a plug and diff oil to our doctor who was in Chinhoyi, since we couldn't move the car! We got it all cleaned up and ready to go to SA! Amazing! I think we can get a free service for our next visit, don't you?
Last night was movie night and we showed Madagascar 2--they loved it. We now have about 200+ people coming each Friday night for our community movie night. As they walked home I could hear a group of kids singing near the township "you've got to move it, move it!" the song from the movie! It was so fun to hear that drifting through the African bush!
This has been a busy week with Wednesday having a staff inservice with our nurses and talking about a patient who got mismanaged in labor. This patient was complete for 5 hours and no one notified the doctor or myself until the baby came out flat and needed to be revived and eventually died within 24 hours. We used this as a "learning experience" to talk about what to do and what is normal when a woman gets to complete. Everyone said the understood! That evening just as I went to do some Lumbar Punctures on the wards, I noticed an OB chart at the nurses desk showing a patient had been complete at 930 a.m. and no further charting. When I asked why the chart was there someone said "oh actually she is not delivered!" I screamed what and went running off to the labor ward. It was now almost 4:30 p.m. and I quickly pulled the baby out with a vacumn extractor and laid into every nurse on that shift and sent for the ones that went home. Luckily the baby was strong and came out screaming! Now both of us were screaming--I am not sure who was louder! So much for understanding the in-service! The answer I got when I asked why they didn't notify someone, was that at 930 they notified the doctor who checked her, ruptured her membranes and told them "she will deliver, don't worry!" So they didn't worry and they were waiting for her to deliver! No charting from 930 a.m. on, no fetal heart, no descent of the head, no contrations because the doctor said she would deliver! I went home with a strong headache that night!
To top it off that afternoon Major got back from 2 days in Harare where he went to get the car serviced in preparation for the trip to SA. when he got on the dirt road he noticed something like diesel flicking up on the back window. When he stopped to check it he couldn't see anything dripping so he came the rest of the way. He got home and had the guys put the car over the pit and surprise--the found they had not put in one of the plugs in where they had drained out the diff oil in and didn't refill it! Amazing that he got here without the engine seizing--a true miracle to drive 350 kms without oil in the diff! He called the garage the next morning ( the main Toyota delaership in Harare) and had them shaking in their boots before he finished with our service rep! They kept asking if the engine was ok! He had them drive out immediately with a plug and diff oil to our doctor who was in Chinhoyi, since we couldn't move the car! We got it all cleaned up and ready to go to SA! Amazing! I think we can get a free service for our next visit, don't you?
Last night was movie night and we showed Madagascar 2--they loved it. We now have about 200+ people coming each Friday night for our community movie night. As they walked home I could hear a group of kids singing near the township "you've got to move it, move it!" the song from the movie! It was so fun to hear that drifting through the African bush!
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