Seeing patients in Garissa
(University of Minnesota public health students are writing about their experiences abroad this summer.)
By Alina Evans
Writing from Kenya
We just got back from starting our human project in Garissa. It was quite an interesting experience. The temperature has been in the 90s and the women all cover their heads and arms. The first day we started seeing patients at about 8:30. The ophthalmologist who is the clinician hired to carry out the study (and will continue for the next 3 years) thought that patients would be more comfortable with only one white person there. So Mindy went to the lab. After a few patients he suggested we go to the children’s clinic to see if there would be cases there. He said I should stay in the children’s clinic because maybe children would be more comfortable with me being there. There were no cases in the children’s clinic. Of the 12 cases that came through the outpatient clinic, 4 of them walked away without getting blood drawn. When we got home and looked at the questionnaires, only 4 of the 12 patients had fevers! Our study is about febrile patients! We brought gloves for the lab technicians drawing blood, but none of them used any – the cleaning people came in and used them! The ophthalmologist said I shouldn’t look in people’s eyes because I might get diseases if I put my face so close – so he has been doing the exams and I have only been looking at the interesting ones.
We still have a lot of kinks to work out – the doctors seem to take blood pressure, heart rate and lung sounds without even touching the patient! Everything happens in Somali, so its challenging to make sure things are done right. According to the data sheets, several patients said they keep camels in their houses! We are teaching the hospital staff how to carry out our methods so that we can continue to get data for three more years. We only brought one thermometer. This became a problem when we tried to sample both in the eye clinic and the outpatient clinic. The ophthalmologist and I walked around the hospital for at least 20 minutes before we could find anyone with a thermometer! Only one doctor in the hospital had a stethoscope. We have ordered a few stethoscopes and thermometers for the doctors involved in our project, but there are so many more that could use them.