Sorry so long..2 Posts

I always forget what I have last written to everyone on here but good news we trapped and killed the critter that has been running around our room every night. We thought it was a mouse but after seeing it’s size and tail I’m pretty sure that it is a rat. Pretty gross. I was relieved to have it taken care of but surprised at how much it really didn’t bother me.
So Tuesday the clinic was slow and I sat down and had a long chat with Joseph the doctor at the clinic. He explained sooo much to me. We started talking about the symptoms of Typhoid and Malaria (fairly the same but I think Typhoid comes with more joint pains). Typhoid, Malaria, and Anemia are the most prevalent viruses here and as I said earlier (I think) are the deadliest. Anemia however usually only affects younger children, mostly with kids from 4-5 months. When children get Malaria the virus takes over the blood cells and lowering the blood levels to toxic amounts causing Anemia. Malaria can be treated but it is more difficult because it’s not something where they can just inject you with medicine and you are cured. Quinine injections are what kills the Malaria virus but because so much has taken over the blood cells the quinine can’t travel through the blood. So patients have ot be administered and set up on a quinine drip with gluocose/glucosinolate do help give the body more energy (I assume to make more blood cells) allowing the quinine to travel through the system. This is timely and expensive and is another reason why Malaria is such killer here; it all comes down to money. I also learned that there is a Malaria vaccination, I had never heard of it before. When Joseph was younger they had a family doctor who was able to vaccinate is whole family for Malaria. He was Malaria free for 17 years, but now has the virus, which I was very surprised to learn. He says that he keeps good care of himself, always eating and drinking plenty of juice to keep his energy and immune system up so he needs little medicine. I’m still a little confused on how that works for him. Apparently the vaccination is 500,000 shillings, which is about $240 for us. No one here can afford that and the government definitely doesn’t fund it. He says that Africa has come a long way with HIV/Aids, providing free testing, counseling, and treatment but now the big killer is also Malaria.
He also explained to me that for women cervical cancer is a huge problem here as well. I guess HPV is pretty bad here, he went into descriptions about it but that isn’t necessary for me to put up on here. He told me that he thinks it has a lot to do with birth control pills. I don’t think it is so much the actual pills as the misunderstanding of what they do or their purpose. I think people are ill informed that it’s strictly to prevent ovulation but does not protect against STI’s. He said left and right women are dying from cervical cancer. It’s so sad these diseases are killing sooo many people and yet there are vaccinations to prevent it but no access to them. I was surprised when he said that he sympathized with the government in why they couldn’t/wouldn’t fund these vaccinations. I think the way he tried to explain it would be so hard for the government to get these vaccinations and actually distribute them. Villages are so far apart form each other, roads are horrible, and there is no telling how many people reside in one community. Either way I still think its sad that there are these vaccinations available but not being used. It sounds like Malaria is the 2nd deadliest disease in Africa next to Aids. It’s really about the only type of patients that come in to the clinic.
You can tell that Joseph is sympathisizes with these people and wants so badly to help. I’m pretty sure I wrote this before about how people are to poor to get transport to clinics, or even to pay for treatment if they some how got there. Clinics can be soo far for people to get to help. So Joseph has this idea that sounds great but sadly I don’t know if it will ever happen. What he wants to do is set up little branches of clinics in other towns. It would be just a few beds and when someone was sick they would phone the Peoples Medical Center (the clinic I’m at), which would be the main branch, and they would send nurses up to that specific branch to assess and give treatment. That way people can have access to medical treatment with out having to travel such far distances. The nurse can either treat the patient there and continue to check up, or it if is serious enough transport the patient to the PMC. It really would help to save so many lives having that availability I just don’t know how he is going to get that with out major sponsoring.
Thursday Alicia and I will be traveling with 2 nurses doing an outreach in a village testing for HIV/Aids. Apparently the process is pretty simple. We have to draw blood from the vein and put it on what he explained to be like a test strip, almost like litmus paper, but I know it has to be a little more complex than that. Then we can offer free counseling and treatment. I’m not really sure how this is all going to go down but I will write all about it after we finish. This is all that I got out of Joseph for the outreach. I really like him, he has been teaching me so much. I enjoy our talks. He loves that we are here. He thinks it's the greatest thing. He said it is an amazing thing that we have come this far to experience this different way of life and the different plagues of Uganda. He likes the fact that we have come to this clinic to get to know them so that when we go back we know that they “are good people and not trying to con us into helping them”. I hope my posts make sense. I’m pretty tired by the end of the day and feel like I can’t put anything into words while I write. Update you on how the outreach goes later. Love you all!!!!!!!!!!!