Feeling Frustrated

[May 18-19, 2017]

The last two days have been both amazing and very frustrating.

yea, got out to walk across this thing. :/

Amazing?

I had the opportunity to travel to some remote villages to open clinics with three other doctors. My translator during this time was a new local grad which was a neat and humbling experience. We held 3 clinics over the course of 2 days all in different villages. In total, about 400 patients were seen. One of the neat things about this was that the first clinic was in one of the very few and small Muslim regions of this country. After the mass genocide in the 20th century, most of the Muslims were killed and even still, the country was predominantly Buddhist before this. The contact in the village was a man who had believed in Jesus only three years before and had gone to Bible school for the last 3 years. After graduating, he returned to his village with a burden to start a church and see others come to know Christ. What an amazing testimony. The joy that he has when speaking about Jesus and the true thankfulness he had for us coming to his village was so humbling.

Clinic #1

One of the most heart-wrenching cases was a teenage girl who had been having seizures for the last two years with vomiting and was seemingly presenting with transient altered LOC. This to me screams: you need a head CT and bloodwork immediately at a hospital. She had been told by a doctor two years ago that she had high triglycerides and that was causing the spells, without imaging or other bloodwork, and was sent home. The family came to us desperate for help. We assessed her the best that we could, gave ORT, the most broad-spectrum antibiotics we had, vitamins and advised that she urgently be send to a hospital for further assessment. We were simply "first aid" level care and she was far sicker than we had the capabilities to manage. She was sent to a hospital but the most frustrating thing was that there was no guarantee that she would actually receive the care that she needed. They were poor, so scans and a lot of blood work were probably not an option. How. How does this happen. How can we have so much in North America and complain that the ER line isn't moving fast enough, that our family physician is taking too long to see us etc when there are people like this all over the world, who barely have a hope of getting basic care. This is a tragedy.

Frustrating?

One of the most frustrating experiences I've had has to do with the role that I have here. Because of the desperate need for help and the perception that foreign graduates have a more comprehensive and rigorous training, the expectations of my knowledge level and skills is, I think, far beyond what it actually is. I have been transparent with my skills and where I am at in my training, as well as the struggle of prescribing adult vs pediatric doses of medications, and having to prescribe medications that are not one's we use where I am from, but I am finding it to be a HUGE challenge. I am asking questions and looking things up to the best of my ability but with language barriers, and without internet or resources in the field, it's extremely hard. I spent a good portion of my day today composing dosing charts to take with me to clinics from now on, something I wish I had done sooner, but will just have to continue to be adamant when I don't know something and bug the other doctors until I have answers, to question dosing and to be judicious in prescriptions.

Apparently this is a "snack"

Prayer Points:

1. Clinics. Please pray that I would have wisdom and knowledge is diagnosing and treating the various illnesses here. Please pray that my questions would be answered and that I would have courage/discernment when to ask for help when I need it and to get it in return. Please pray that I would receive more guidance from the native doctors.
2. Encouragement. Because I am feeling pretty overwhelmed with the gaps in my knowledge and skills, I am honestly feeling pretty discouraged. I came here to help and serve but right now I'm feeling like I might be doing more damage than good. Most of the cases are pretty straight forward but I just don't want to be taking away from a people that already are in need of so much.

Clinic #2

Protect yo self.

My translator and a local recent graduate!