Safari – TIA

            Even though it has already been a week since I arrived back in the states, I still wanted to share about our last weekend in Kenya and the safari! On Saturday morning, we left Kijabe for Nairobi around 8:30 in the morning. After dropping off our luggage at the Makazi apartments (the apartments we’ve always stayed at while in Nairobi), we headed to the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust to watch baby elephants play. Of course they were so cute. There was a little watering hole that they seemed to like rolling around in. We were also able to touch them if they came by us. Their skin is very rough and dry, and they have little wiry hairs all over.

While the elephants were fed and played, one of the trainers told everyone about the orphanage and each of the baby elephants there. Most of the elephants end up at the orphanage if they fall into a well or if their mother was killed by poachers. They live at the orphanage until they are about 3 years old and at that time they are reintroduced to the wild along with other elephants that are old enough to be released. The keepers who work at the orphanage actually sleep with the elephants because they need to eat three times throughout the night and need to be covered with a blanket. These elephants are better cared for than many of the people in this country! While we were there, we also saw a rhino. It was huge, but unfortunately it was asleep. That night we all met up for dinner at a nearby mall. We ate at a Java House for the third time. The food really isn’t even that great there, but I guess it’s just easy. I would have liked to try something different and more exciting.

            The next morning, we woke up early to begin our trip to the Masai Mara. The drive was extremely long. It took us about 2 hours to just get to the road that leads to the Masai Mara, and then we had to drive for about 3 more hours after that. Two of those hours were on one of the bumpiest roads I’ve been on in Kenya. And that’s saying a lot. We just kept driving deeper and deeper into the middle of nowhere. I kept thinking we had to be there soon, but we would just keep driving. Finally, we arrived at our hotel – Sarova Hotel, Mara Camp. When we drove up to the gates, there were about ten Masai women ready with handfuls of bracelets, necklaces, and carvings to try to sell us. The women are very persistent. They even opened one of the windows of one of our safari cars! I think their tactic is to stress you out so much that you buy something so they will go away.

Masai women at the entrance to Sarova

           The hotel was really nice. Our rooms were actually tents! But they weren’t your average tent. The back of the room/tent was actually three walls of stone to make up the bathroom area. The tent was also covered by a roof. So it was pretty luxurious as far as tents go. As soon as we arrived at the hotel, we had a late lunch in the dining room. The food was amazing – definitely the best food we’d had in a while. After lunch we put our stuff in our tents and got ready for our first drive out on the Masai Mara.

   

The tent

Our room

              Our first drive was only about an hour long, but we actually saw so many animals! We had only driven about 50 feet out of the entrance to the hotel when we saw a lion guarding a dead buffalo! It’s so amazing to be as close as we got to the animals. And they don’t even seem to care that we are there. I guess they are probably used to the safari cars driving all around them. As we continued driving, we saw tons of zebras, all types of gazelles and antelopes, buffalo, warthogs, vultures, and more lions. The Masai Mara looks like what you would think Africa looks like. Partway through our drive, the car I was in started leaking oil all over the place. Apparently the cap had come off somewhere down the road, so luckily there wasn’t too much damage. But because we couldn’t ride in our car anymore, we had to all pile into one safari car (originally in two). We thought it would be really fun to jump in the grass for a minute while transferring, but our driver made sure we weren’t out of the car for too long. It’s a 10,000 KSh fine if you are caught outside out your car! Once we were all settled into the one safari car, it started to rain. At first the rain was pretty light, so we continued our drive. Over the radio, our driver heard that there was a leopard somewhere nearby. We couldn’t see it at first, but then our driver decided to drive off the path so we could get a better view. We were only able to see the leopard for a minute or so, but it was still really amazing. We couldn’t stay long since the rain was starting to fall harder and we didn’t want to get stuck in the mud. Since leopards are so good at hiding themselves, it is very common not to see one at all during your safari. So even though the rain cut our first drive short, we were still able to see so many amazing animals.

The lion guarding his kill

              On Monday, we woke up early to spend a full day out on the Masai Mara. As soon as we left the hotel, we saw the same lion just 50 feet or so outside of the entrance, still guarding his kill. During our drive we saw all the animals that we saw the day before (minus the leopard) as well as several more that we hadn’t seen yet. We saw elephants, giraffes, ostriches, hyenas, and even cheetahs! We also drove to the border of Kenya and Tanzania where you can look across the Mara River and see the Serengeti. We even got out of the car and walked over into Tanzania – so now I can say I’ve been to two African countries! After our stop in Tanzania, we followed the river to a spot where tons of hippos and crocs hang out. We had to have a ranger with a machine gun give us our tour! It was really awesome – I wish I had an audio clip of the sound they make. It kind of sounds like grunting and laughing at the same time. Once we finished our tour of the hippos, we headed across the river to eat lunch. There were these monkeys called blue monkeys that kept trying to steal our food. One of them was actually successful in opening Peter’s lunch box and stealing a biscuit out of it! When we finished with lunch, we piled back into our safari cars and continued our drive. We saw more of the same amazing animals. You never really get enough of it.

         
              At the end of our drive, we went to a nearby Masi village where we were able to get a tour after paying 1,000 KSh (~$10). The men came out and did their warrior dance and challenged each other by jumping as high as they could straight into the air. It was really interesting to see the mud/dung huts that these people live in. The huts are actually made to house not only the family, but also the calves, which are at the center of Masai livelihood. We got tours of the homes, the pen for goats and older cows, and were shown how they make fire. They rub sticks together and use elephant dung and straw. It was kind of sad to see how the kids lined up for us to see them. They didn’t even have to be told what to do when they saw us. After we finished touring the compound, we were led outside to an area where they had set up souvenirs for us to buy. I left with a few bracelets to add to my collection from Kenya. 

At the Masai village

            Our last day in Kenya started with an early dawn drive. We left the hotel at 6:30 am. As soon as we left, we saw hyenas, jackals, and vultures scavenging the buffalo remains that the lion had left behind. It was a pretty slow morning at first. We saw antelopes and impalas and lots of guinea fowl. The most exciting part of the drive was when we spotted a huge heard of buffalo start running all together in one direction. When our driver saw this, he sped over there and by the time that we got there, there were about five lionesses on top of a buffalo. The buffalo was still alive and kicking, but the lions weren’t letting it go anywhere. We could see the male lion watching from a little ways back as well as the babies from the other side. I think we were probably surrounded by at least 20 lions. Once we finished watching the lions, we had to hurry back to the hotel so we could pack up and head to Kijabe. 

Lions killing a buffalo

            We arrived in Kijabe at 1:15 and joined the conference that was already going on. One of our deans at UTMB was actually giving the lecture and it was cool to be able to see him and hear his speech. We gave everyone a quick tour of the hospital before we had to leave to make it to the airport in time to catch out flights.

            This whole experience was so amazing for me and I know I’m so blessed to have had this opportunity. Thanks for reading!

Last Day at Kijabe Hospital

            So today was our last day at the hospital. We woke up a little earlier than usual to attend CME, which of course started late. While we were getting ready, our electricity went out for a little while. I was so confused why the toaster would break on our last day here, when I realized that the light also wouldn’t turn on. For this week’s CME, Dr. Mireille presented about WHO staging of HIV. We were missing the projector, so everyone gathered around the computer screen to be able to see the presentation slides. When Dr. Mireille had finished, she handed everyone pieces of paper with different opportunistic infections that HIV positive patients suffer from written on them and we had to assign each of them to the correct stage.

            After CME, we went down to the clinic to do some more glucose screening. We had been worried about getting the 30 patients we had been allowed to collect data on, but we ended up getting enough today! It is interesting that out of 30 patients, only 3 of them are males. Dr. Mireille told us that it is much easier to get women to come to the clinic for HIV care because they also need to come for prenatal care. When we tested patients, we also measured their height, weight, blood pressure, waist, and hips. I remember one woman who we tested had a larger waist than her hips. After Dr. Mireille saw her, she said that she found a mass in her abdomen and had ordered an ultrasound for her. When the results came back, we found out that she was actually 8 months pregnant and had no idea! Sounds just like that TLC show, “I didn’t know I was pregnant.” The pregnancy hadn’t been caught earlier because the woman had been reporting a period every month. I think she must have been in denial.

            Once we finished our glucose screening, we headed to peds for a while and then the women’s ward. We didn’t see anything too extraordinary, but it was nice to get a chance to say thank you and goodbye to the doctors and residents who had allowed us to follow them around the last few weeks. We took tea and chapati before going home to have lunch. I am going to miss chapati, and I might have to start drinking hot tea every now and then when I’m back home. However, I do think that part of the reason I like the tea so much is because it is so cold here. It was especially cold today. Before we went back to the hospital after lunch, I put my northface jacket on under my white coat.

            There wasn’t much for us to do the rest of the day while we were at the hospital. We hung around with everyone from the clinic and took pictures with them. I don’t really feel ready to leave everyone here, especially since I don’t know if I will ever see them again, but I am also very ready to see all of my family and friends.

            After we left the hospital, we met up with Dr. Keiser to go on a hike up one of the nearby hills. It was actually a pretty difficult hike. It was very steep and a little slippery at times. I felt like I was in a scene from Jurasic Park with all the tall trees with vines hanging down from them. From a few clearings along the way we had a great view of the hospital compound. I was hoping to see a baboon or two, but we had no such luck. Still it was a beautiful hike, and even though I was sweating and tired, I was very glad we did it.

            I am not sure if I will be able to post for the remainder of the trip, so I will go ahead and lay out our plans for the next few days. Tomorrow, we will be leaving Kijabe with Dr. Keiser around 8 or 9 am. From there we will be going straight to the Elephant orphanage in Nairobi, where we will meet up with everyone from House of Hope. The elephants at the Elephant orphanage can only be viewed from 11-noon so I’m not sure what we will be doing the rest of the day. On Sunday morning, we will leave for our safari on the Masai Mara. We will be on safari from Sunday through Tuesday morning when we will be going on a “dawn game drive.” Not exactly sure what that means, but I think it means we will be getting up super early to drive around and look at animals. After the dawn game drive, everyone will head to Kijabe to hear Dr. Leiberman, one of UTMBs professors, present a lecture at noon. After that, we will head to the airport for the long journey home. Now it’s time for me to stop blogging and go pack!   

Thursday - Week 3

I woke up this morning at about 6:30 to something buzzing in my ear. I wasn’t ready to get up yet so I put my ear plugs in my ears. For some reason I thought that whatever it was would decide to fly into my ear and then get stuck there. Apparently it was more interested in my forehead than my ears because when I finally got out of bed I had two big welts on my forehead. They aren’t red or itchy so I’m not too worried. We arrived at the hospital around 8:30 and began our day in the AIDs Relief clinic taking glucose levels and vital signs. We now have a total of 20 patients enrolled in our research. We still want to hit our target of 30, but we are happy that we will at least have 20.

            Once we ran out of testing strips, we decided to go to peds and join in on rounds with the peds team. We saw some of the patients we had seen before. We also saw a little girl from the AIDs Relief clinic. When she saw us, she recognized us right away and started waving and calling for us to come over. She was the little girl that we walked over to casualty from the clinic on Tuesday.

            After rounds with peds, Isaac arranged for us to see a surgery with Dr. Bird, one of the general surgeons here at Kijabe. We changed into clean scrubs, hair nets, and shoe covers before entering the theatre. The surgery that we got to see was the removal of a goiter, or a thyroidectomy. This woman’s thyroid had grown so large that it had pushed its way down into her chest and had displaced her trachea. Normally the thyroid sits just below your Adam’s apple. They prepped the entire chest just in case the sternum had to be split open to remove the thyroid! Dr. Bird is from Australia so of course he has an awesome accent. While he worked he would quiz Neeli and I about anatomy and which structures he needed to be careful of. We had probably been in the OR for about 45 minutes when Neeli told me she needed to go outside of the room to get some fresh air. She felt like she couldn’t breathe through the face mask. Next thing I knew, out of the corner of my eye I see some commotion and arms flailing around. I rushed out of the OR with a couple of nurses and they already had Neeli on an open bed. She had fainted about 2 seconds after stepping outside of the OR. One of the Kenyan nurses asked her if she had taken tea and when Neeli told her no, she was like, “Oh, well no wonder you fainted!” That’s when they sent us up to the doctor’s lounge to have some chai. Chai is like their cure-all here. Neeli was a really good sport. She was even laughing at herself saying that it was a good thing she left the OR when she did! After we finished our chai, I went back to the OR for a little while and Neeli decided to go back to the AIDs Relief clinic. I stayed in the OR for about another hour or so before my stomach told me I better leave and get some lunch before I fainted too.

            For lunch, I had chips (French fries) and a samosa at the cafeteria with Neeli and Caley. Since we didn’t have lunch until about 2:30, there wasn’t much else for us to do around the hospital when we finished. We wandered around a bit, but gave up a little bit before 4 and went home. We sat around and read our books until Dr. Keiser and Caley came over for dinner. We made English muffin pizzas, which actually turned out pretty good! They were just like big bagel bites. The pizza crust we bought at Nakumat about a week ago had already gotten moldy so we had to improvise. After Dr. Keiser and Caley left, Neeli and I got back to our daily routine of reading, boiling water, showering, and checking our emails –then bed!  

Holiday in Kenya

            Today was a very relaxing day. We didn’t go to the hospital because it is a holiday here. Instead we got to sleep in a little bit, but got woken up around 8:15 to Grace knocking on our door to pick up the things she had left for us to look at the night before. She hurried off after we paid for the few things we had picked out like she always does. I never understand why she is in such a hurry, but she always rushes off like she has some important appointment to make. For most of the day we sat either inside or outside reading. I’m a little embarrassed because I started reading a book over a week ago and still haven’t finished it, while Neeli started hers like 3 days ago and is already done. Now I am determined to finish it at least before leaving Kenya.

            In the afternoon I went on a run around the hospital compound. I only ran for about 15 minutes, but I almost passed out! Not only is Kijabe at 8,000 feet elevation, but I was running uphill for the first half of my run! I can understand why Kenyans always win the Boston marathon. When I got back to our house, Neeli and I decided to go on a walk. While on our walk, we ran into Caley so she joined us and we showed her the village grocery shop and market.

            For dinner, Dr. Keiser, Caley, me and Neeli all went to Mama Chicoo’s, the only restaurant in town. We had chipati, rice, beef stew, cabbage, a potato, beans, and some sort of carrot stew. It was all pretty good. I think Caley was a little worried about getting sick, but Neeli and I have told to several people who have eaten there and were fine. I actually feel very lucky because I haven’t gotten sick at all during my time in Africa. The medicine that I’ve used the most has actually been Benadryl. I hardly ever have allergies back in the US, but here I’m itchy and sneezy all the time.

            Sadly, we never got a call to go to the hospital to see a c-section today. Maybe we will get to see something exciting tomorrow. We only have two more days at the hospital! I think I am getting ready to be back home, but I know I will miss it here. 

Monday and Tuesday - Week 3

            Monday was a pretty slow day. We arrived at the hospital around 9 am to start our glucose screening research. We were only approved to do the testing on the AIDs Relief patients so our population isn’t so random. It took us about 4 hours just to collect data on only 8 patients. In the afternoon, we wandered around the hospital looking for doctors or residents we knew to follow, but we really couldn’t find anyone. One of our resident friends in the women’s ward gave us a lecture about malaria, typhoid, and cholera. I had to take notes on what he was saying because I was afraid I would fall asleep right in front of him if I didn’t! We saw a few patients in MCH (maternal and child health) outpatient. One 11 month old baby was so malnourished that he only weighed 0.2 kg over his birth weight, which was 4.1 kg. When we finished up at the hospital, we went to the little market near the hospital and bought a mango, a pineapple, and some orange juice. We had wanted to make pizza for dinner again, but unfortunately our pizza crust already started to mold!

            Today was a much busier day. We began our day with the pediatric team and went on rounds with them. We saw one girl with cryptococcal meningitis. She was admitted on Friday, but the course of treatment for this type of infection will require her to stay in the hospital for at least a week and a half more. Another child was severely hypothermic and had been admitted to the hospital with a temperature of 30 degrees Celsius (about 86 F). Since being in the hospital, her temperature has raised and the team will probably be able to discharge her soon. We saw several other patients with interesting histories, but not anything worth sharing. I think it was just interesting because it was something different. After rounds, we took tea with the peds team. We asked the residents if they knew of any surgeons who wouldn’t mind us watching a surgery and I think they will be able to work something out for us. When we finished our tea, we went to the AIDs Relief clinic to see if there were any patients we could do our glucose screening on. It was actually really busy when we arrived there and since the nurses were still off taking tea, Neeli and I took vitals for all the patients waiting and screened those who consented and were over 18. Even with these patients, we have only gathered data for 13 patients total. I’m hoping we are able to get all 30 before we leave on Friday! We left the hospital for lunch around 1:20. When we were on our way back to the hospital after finishing lunch, we ran into Dr. Keiser and Caley. For those who don’t know, Dr. Keiser is an infections disease doctor at UTMB and is responsible for running the Kenya elective. Caley also works for UTMB as the Global Health Director. We chatted with them for a while and gave them a quick tour of our house before walking to the hospital together. We checked the AIDs Relief clinic to see if any new patients had come since we were last there, but there were none. While we were there, Dr. Mireille asked us to walk one of the patients over to casualty because she needed to be admitted to the hospital. She was a little 3 year old who was having difficulty breathing. I felt so bad for her because she started crying hysterically every time the nurse tried to put on the nasal canula. I don’t think I would like it very much either. We saw another patient in casualty with tachypnea and difficutly breathing; we found out later that he probably has pericardial TB. It’s crazy – TB is on the top of almost every differential diagnosis at Kijabe Hospital. After a while we ran into Isaac, one of the Kenyan residents we have made friends with. He told us that we should be able to see a surgery on Thursday or Friday. He also said that he would give us a call tomorrow if there happened to be a c-section. We saw a cardiac ultrasound and a few more patients before leaving the hospital for the day.

            Around 6:15, we left our house to walk over to where Dr. Keiser and Caley were staying to have dinner. We didn’t get very far from our house, however, when Grace stopped us and said that she wanted to leave some of her things at our house for us to look at later. She would come back in the morning to pick them up and we could buy anything we wanted then. I think it’s funny how trusting she is! For dinner, Dr. Keiser made spaghetti and for dessert, we ate the pineapple that Neeli and I had brought over. We had a good time chatting with Dr. Keiser and Caley about our experiences at Kijabe so far. Dr. Keiser told us some stories from when he was in medical school – much crazier than anything we have seen in Kenya!

            Tomorrow is a Kenyan holiday so I’m not exactly sure what we will be doing. I know that the AIDs Relief clinic will be closed, but we may still go to the hospital to see a delivery or c-section. I guess we will see!

Hell’s Gate and House of Hope

            On Friday morning we got to the hospital at 8am. We were headed toward the AIDs Relief clinic to attend CME when we ran into Jane, one of the clinic’s administrators. She quickly turned us around and told us – no, we needed to go to chapel. So we went to chapel, which was pretty much just like it was the day before except this time the kitchen staff performed a song instead of the doctors. After chapel, we went to the clinic and waited for a while until everyone was ready for the CME lecture. It was a quick one about electrolyte imbalance and I actually found it very informative. In medical school, I sometimes feel like I am supposed to know things that I’ve never actually been taught about. I guess those things are supposed to be my own “learning issues.” At the end of the lecture, the AIDs Relief staff said goodbye to one of its members who would be leaving the team for another position. This went on for quite a while because almost everyone was asked to say something about this person.

            After CME, we went up to the women’s ward and followed around Dr. Shirley and his team. We saw two new patients, but the rest were the same as the previous days. One of the new patients had actually been transferred from ICU. She had suffered a hemorrhagic stroke and they were having a really hard time controlling her blood pressure, which was running in the 200s/100s. By noon I was really itching to leave the hospital because I was excited to go to Hell’s Gate.

The Watering hole

             We met up with our driver around 12:45 and set off for Hell’s Gate. On our way there, we got the see Lake Naivasha and Mt. Longoknot. We also saw the town of Naivasha, which is much bigger than Kijabe or any of the other towns I have seen. We passed some very nice resorts and several flower farms. The flower farms are like their own little villages because they provide housing and schools for the workers and their families. We arrived at Hell’s Gate National Park at about 2pm and when we went to buy our tickets, the man working the booth said, “Welcome to Hell.” The park is really cool. You have the option of walking, biking, or driving through it. We opted to drive since we came with a driver. Our driver, Benson, was also our tour guide. His van was actually really great for the park. He popped up the roof so we could stand up and look out and get a really good view while still in the car. Almost immediately we saw some gazelles, and as we kept driving we saw tons of zebras and warthogs. We stopped and got out of the car at one of the watering holes where there were several giraffes, zebras, and warthogs. The giraffes look so funny when they are drinking water. We were actually able to get pretty close to them and they didn’t do anything – just stared at us. Hell’s Gate looked a lot more like what I thought Africa would look like. Benson told us that it was the site Disney artists used to model the landscape in The Lion King after. We continued driving until we reached a picnic area. Here, Benson parked the car and we got out for a little hike. We definitely didn’t realize what kind of hike we were in for. I was wearing Toms and Neeli had on converses. Not exactly the best shoes for hiking. We were basically shimmying up and down huge boulders to make our way down into the gorge. I really enjoyed the hike and I even managed to make it through without falling once! Poor Neeli wasn’t so lucky though. She fell twice! But don’t worry – she didn’t get hurt and was laughing on the way down. After about an hour and a half of hiking, we arrived back at the picnic site. At the picnic site there is a sign that says “beware of baboons.” We saw a few at the picnic site, but as we were leaving, we saw a ton of them just outside the site. On our way out of Hell’s Gate, we saw all the same animals that we saw before, plus some African buffalo.

            From there we headed to House of Hope. House of Hope is an orphanage outside of Nairobi that 5 other UTMB students have been working at. They have their own school and a small clinic there. I was told that there are 127 orphans who live at House of Hope and about 170 children who attend school there. While driving through Nairobi, we got stuck in terrible traffic again. They really need to discontinue the old round-abouts here. You literally sit without moving for 15-20 minutes at a time! We were stuck in Nairobi for 2 miserable hours worth of traffic. We finally got out of traffic and arrived at House of Hope at almost 9pm. Friday was Michael’s birthday, so earlier that day the UTMB crew at House of Hope went to the Masai market to buy two goats to roast for dinner. They slaughtered them and everything – I’m glad we missed out on that part! We were introduced to everyone and then joined in on the feast. We ate ugali with the goat. Ugali kind of looks like mashed potatoes, but it is actually made out of corn flour and has a pretty bland taste. After we ate, we went to play with the kids. As soon as we walked over to where they were, they were shouting our names and grabbing our hands. By the end of the night, some of the little girls were already trying to teach me African dance moves.

            Saturday morning we got up early for breakfast. We had sweet potatoes, some fried African bread, and fried eggs. We also drank chai with breakfast, at 10 am, at 4 pm, and after dinner. The chai is the milky tea stuff that I don’t really care for at Kijabe, but I actually think I don’t like it there because the smell of it is so strong mixed with the smells of body odor, sweat, and sick, coughing patients. They are very religious about tea time at House of Hope. After breakfast, we spent some time at the clinic. There were only a few patients, one of whom had a positive malaria smear. The others weren’t anything too exciting to mention. The rest of the day we pretty much just relaxed. Lauren gave us a tour of the compound. We saw where they keep the farm animals and where they grow all their vegetables and such. Later on in the afternoon, we went to the roof of one of the buildings to lay out in the sun. After that we went to do arts and crafts with the kids before tea time at 4. Their craft was to cut pictures that they liked out of the newspaper and glue them to a poster board. It was funny because they would pick like car advertisements, pictures of political leaders, and other really random things to glue on the board. Before dinner, we learned how to make chipati. Chipati looks like a tortilla, but it has a different taste and texture. It is much more complicated to make it than I would have thought! I’m hoping I can remember how to make it so that everyone can try it back home. After dinner, we went back up to the roof to watch the stars and listen to music before watching the Barcelona-Manchester game. It didn’t start until 9:45 in Kenya so we only made it to a little bit past half-time before we were all dozing off.

            Sunday, we had breakfast at 8, and in between breakfast and church we practiced the song “Lean on Me” to sing at the kids Big Sunday Revival later that day. Church lasted for 3 1/2 hours. A little bit longer than I am used to, especially since we couldn’t understand the majority of what was being sang/said. Also, the entire service was run by the children this Sunday. We even got to listen to a 9 year old preacher! To our surprise, we were called up to sing our song during church. We weren’t ready and most of us hadn’t brought our copy of the words, so it wasn’t that great of a performance. They said they liked it anyway though. After the service, we all ate lunch together before breaking for a few hours. At 3pm, the revival picked up again and the kids started to sing, dance, and do skits. While I was sitting watching the performances, I had at least seven kids around me playing with my hair, my watch, or my camera. They love to have their photo taken. Around 5 we left the revival to grab an early dinner with Benson (House of Hope’s doctor) and the UTMB group before leaving for Kijabe. It was kind of scary driving in the dark, but we made it home safe and sound!

*I tried adding pictures, but our internet is too slow. I'll have to share later!

Thursday

             So today was a pretty uneventful day. We got up early to attend a CME lecture by one of the doctors we shadow, but when we got to the hospital a little bit before 7am, no one was in the conference room. We thought that maybe no one was there yet, but we could hear Dr. Shirley’s voice coming from the room next door. It sounded like he hadn’t just started his lecture, but was somewhere in the middle of it. After waiting a few minutes, we decided to stick our heads in and see if it was where we were supposed to be. Well, we were definitely wrong. No one even said anything to us when we stuck our heads in. A few minutes later, Dr. Mireille showed up and did the same thing. Apparently there had been some miscommunication concerning where the lecture would be and who would be attending. I have learned that you really can’t count on anything going exactly as planned before 8am in Kenya.

            At 7:45 we went to chapel. This week is spiritual emphasis week at Kijabe Hospital. At the beginning of chapel, we sang songs and at the end of each song, the chorus was sung in Swahili. I obviously couldn’t join in, but it sounded cool!  

Kijabe's Chapel

After chapel we did rounds and saw most of the same patients we saw the day before. One patient had actually been discharged, but because her family could not pay her hospital bill, she was still in her bed. After rounds we had tea with Dr. Shirley. He told us about how national health insurance in Kenya is only equivalent to about $8 a year, but that hardly anyone purchases it. He also told us how some patients are abandoned by their families when their hospital bills get too high for them to pay. At that point the hospital must absorb the fees. It’s really sad especially since Kijabe Hospital is one of the nicer hospitals around with a relatively wealthier patient population.

The only other interesting thing from today was that the power went out twice during my shower tonight. That was fun. Luckily it came back on pretty quickly both times. We are used to the lights flickering, but they usually don’t go all the way out!

Tomorrow, we will only be in the hospital until noon and in the afternoon we will be taking a little trip to Hell’s Gate National Park. It is near Kijabe and from there we will head to House of Hope to meet up with our friends for the weekend.