Community clinic and A&E Gizo

First hospital day I went on whats called a GUNS clinic - no idea what it stands for! But it's a small group of nurses that go out to remote villages. This time we went on a little boat over very rough seas to a tiny village on Kolombangara island to do a school visit. Unfortunately the school was having exams so half the kids the clinic was aimed at werent tehre! but for the few that were we did head to toe examinations checking or any abnormalities with any kind of system basically! One of the kids had a booming heart murmur - but the reality is that although we referred him to hospital on the main island, there isnt actually anything they are likely to be able to do! If he goes to the capital - which is unlikely because of the distance, they have only one day of the week where an echo might be able to confimr the type of murmur...but there isnt any surgery that can be done for him now... We also checked that they had had their BCG vacc and gave them tetanus and polio vaccination.
After we'd seen all the kids there, we packed up and went over to one of the nurses houses to wait for the tropical rain to stop! Dodged some pretty huge spiders along the way and hoped not to see any crocs!

Spent today in A&E Gizo. What an experience that was! There was just me and one otehr med student running the place... my medicine/common sense is surprisingly good when it needs to be! I ended up prescribing drugs, most of the time which werent even available from the phamarcy - including basica antiobios. WISHED i'd brought my BNF. Luckily, the Oxford Handbook has a surprising amount of info in it! Saw lots of interesting cases, had to tell some pts to wait and come back another day when a doc was around becasue there was nothing i could confidently do to help them! I ended up using tyhe light on my mobile phone as a light for doing female speculum exams - because there is no light in A&E. Its SO basic! Theres just no equipment - there are barely any sterile gloves, the one sink doesnt always have running water, crazy. Learnt TONS though, esp dosages of drugs that were regularly being needed - the nurses came in SUPER handy for that info too!

xx