20100828 by Tom

We have had a very noisy night. The wild and the other dogs have been howling and barking and kept us awake most part of the night. There was other animals awake too: Maria found their traces in the bread and on the potatoes. It must have been rats or some other form of gnarling animals. Well dr Jan was to leave at 0900 and Maria was thinking of taking the opportunity to go to Ndola. Dennis said it was all right so when I returned from my rount to the children´s ward she was gone.

The round was quiet and “sister” Timoty followed me although he was seemingly very tired.

We sent some patients home one because her mother wished it, and the child was not too sick.

One very seldom see osteo-myelitis in fractures in children, bur we have one with an old fracture of the femur, supposedly healed, that had started to produce suppuration. After two weeks of antibiotics (cloxacillin p.o.) it had almost dried up and there was no more foul smell. He must according to western standards go on eating his pills for at least two months to avoid recurrence, so I pointed out very clearly how important it was that he took his pills as prescribed (meaning not to sell them outside the hospital). If they did not follow prescription he would very soon be back in hospital and back to square one, if not worse. We also sent home some diarrheas without loose stools and other uncomplicated cases tha did not qualify for the ward. A severely burnt hand was redressed by Timoty and I do not think it has any future as the fingers are to severely burnt and the child is holding the wrist in 90 degrees angel to ease the pain. If he gets stiff with the hand in this position he will be unable to use it for any purpose. We try to keep the wrist straight with a bandage with specula as support but some of the personnel have not gotten the idea straight, so they try to put the specula along the fingers instead.

When I got “home” I tried to fix a leaking warm water pipe with silvertape but failed, so it will go on dripping until you change the pipe which could take months. I expect to have lunch when Maria returns from Ndola. Of course she did and we had our lunch. The afternoon was mainly spent on the hard tree-sofa outside MBA trying to get contact with the internet. We failed but decided to have another try tomorrow.

We were still rather tired so we went to bed early.