Junior

Junior arrived from a referring hospital with his grandmother. He had been ill for 6 days and presented unconscious, seizing and febrile. His labs showed malaria, a low hemoglobin of 3 (normal 12 and above), low calcium of 1 (normal 8 – 10) and an elevated white blood count.  Treatment was started.

With a lot of praying and help from our growing expat consulting service (thank you Dr. Angela!), Junior improved over the next few days and was discharged much better than he arrived!

Come to me all you who labor and I will give you rest.

Minette was a little girl who came in with difficulty breathing and swelling of her legs. She had so much difficulty breathing that she had to sleep sitting almost upright and her breathing was extremely labored for several days. Every time I saw her I thought, “How long will she be able to breathe like this?” I felt that at any moment her breathing could just give out. She had malaria that caused severe anemia which in turn caused heart failure. We treated her with blood transfusions, oxygen, and medicine to help her heart and finally after about 4 days she improved. I knew she was better the day I came in and she was lying down to rest. “Come to me all you who labor and I will give you rest.” Matthew 11:28

First Few Weeks

We have been spending the first few weeks shadowing the doctors at St. Martin De Porres.

Dr. Tim and wife Sheila have been helping us to settle in and we have really enjoyed their camaraderie and wisdom from their years of mission work. 

We are seeing many of the common illnesses we saw in Ghana.
AIDS, Malaria, Typhoid, Meningitis and the various obstetrical complications.

One of the big differences is that the people with HIV are now being treated with medications.  This was not the case in 1990s. Now there is hope and acceptance (or at least more so than we experienced before)

Dr Tim and Sheila leave this week and the Obstetrician leaves for vacation (gone for a month)  in September.  The kids will begin school September 2nd so we are gearing up for a busy September!