Chidamoyo Hospital in Zimbabwe

This week Megan combined her work with our work with women on ART treatment.  We will be testing them with VIAC (visual inspection Analysis of Cervix) to assess cervical changes that could easily be cancer and also she will be doing cytology on those patients as well as testing menstrual pads for viral loads. On Mondays we draw viral loads on HIV patients so we had a support meeting and Megan and her research assistants then explained their program to the women.  They were very excited to have this service offered to them.  We hope we can stop cervical cancer before it gets too far along in these high risk patients. On Wednesday Nikki, Justin and son Noah Hess joined us for 3 days.  They represent ZRSP (Zimbabwe Rural Schools Program) that have been working with Major for several years to build and develop schools in our area.  They have built school blocks at Kemapondo and Batanai and have build new schools at Mukowe and Davare.  They have provided everything from boreholes for

This morning I awoke to a call to come to the hospital for 2 C/Sections.  One of our doctors who does anesthesia is away for 5 days at a workshop and our nurse anesthetist is on leave for the month--so I am call to do anesthesia. We started work at 0700 and worked until just past 10 a.m.  Delivered 2 baby boys and moms and babies are doing fine.  Then I came home to shower, eat and go back up to do the discharges for the day.  I got home again about 12:30 p.m. On Thursday morning Megan and Soren and Sara took off for a few days at Rhino Camp.  They were a big help to us here and we wish them well as they return to Stanford to work on their prototype.  Sara got to help with a C/Section when she was here and was so excited to do that. Megan returns tonight and will be here through Friday to work on her research.  Monday and Tuesday Dr. Isala and Major will be away in Chinhoyi for a 2 day District health meeting--so I get to be here by myself keeping the hospital running.  I ref

Part of life at Chidamoyo is visitors in and out.  On the 25th of February our 5 Ohio state Medical students left for a few days at Victoria Falls and Harare before they left for home on the 2nd and 3rd of March.  We said goodbye to Muneeb, Seema, Kate, Sam and Sophia and wish them well in their matches for residency and future careers in medicine. On the 24th of February we had Dr. David Katzenstein from Stanford and Dr. Aunet Rosenthal from Tel Aviv, Israel and Caroline Maposa from Harare here through the 26th.  We were discussing our research project we are doing with our 340+ kids on ART treatment for AIDS.  We discussed where do we go from now and what are some of the social issues of the kids who are failing on the drugs.  It was a fun and busy time. On Monday the 27th we were joined by 3 other Ohio State Medical students who had been doing their elective in Harare and wanted a "bush experience" too.  Stu, Jessica and Cindy joined us for 4 days and got to help wit