Hello all again from Tenwek, Bomet, Kenya. We had a great night, both patients made it out of the OR one was about 1530 and the other was midnight. Both came out very sick but the first case is was extubated early this morning, and the other is still on the vent doing better than last night. Is on 
pretty high vent settings. Both surgery's involved repairing the heart valves. The second case was three valves.
Anyway, things are going well, the ICU recover area is very basic and recovery is very basic with basic supplies and equipment. We are truly lucky to have what we do, it has really helped me realize how blessed we are to have what we do even with our very difficult and hard to work with system.
THe staff here at TEnwek hospital are awesome they are all eager to learn, and are excited we are here. We have been working with other ICU nurses here at the hospital and they are just great, we obviously couldn't work without them.
I think the things that stands out to me the most is how basic the iv pumps are, the availability of medications, and the equipment we have to use.
They just took the first case for day two back to the OR and are busy
putting IV lines and making other preparations for surgery.
There are six beds in this ICU they use it a lot for overflow, they brought a patient in here yesterday that had aspirated and had to be intubated, after things were kind of settled her ECHO showed she only had a EF of 10% and she fairly old (80yo). We have heard from the locals that since her outcome wasn't very good that it comes down to either keep her on lifesupport or be able to provide food for their families. This is pretty opposite for us in the US.
The other overflow patients have been infants and small children who have presented with respiratory compromise related too much narcotics (we see this too in the states). The have a infant warmer in this ICU and we saw three newborns rush by us, one was pretty blue which I would guess had a very low apgar score, wasn't breathing, and was pretty blue. It was pretty neat to see that she was finally resuscitated and was doing well.
That is all for now, I know this is sort of disorganized and may not make much sense, I am sorry for that I hope that you will understand.
More to come later.
pretty high vent settings. Both surgery's involved repairing the heart valves. The second case was three valves.Anyway, things are going well, the ICU recover area is very basic and recovery is very basic with basic supplies and equipment. We are truly lucky to have what we do, it has really helped me realize how blessed we are to have what we do even with our very difficult and hard to work with system.
THe staff here at TEnwek hospital are awesome they are all eager to learn, and are excited we are here. We have been working with other ICU nurses here at the hospital and they are just great, we obviously couldn't work without them.
I think the things that stands out to me the most is how basic the iv pumps are, the availability of medications, and the equipment we have to use.
They just took the first case for day two back to the OR and are busy
putting IV lines and making other preparations for surgery.
There are six beds in this ICU they use it a lot for overflow, they brought a patient in here yesterday that had aspirated and had to be intubated, after things were kind of settled her ECHO showed she only had a EF of 10% and she fairly old (80yo). We have heard from the locals that since her outcome wasn't very good that it comes down to either keep her on lifesupport or be able to provide food for their families. This is pretty opposite for us in the US.The other overflow patients have been infants and small children who have presented with respiratory compromise related too much narcotics (we see this too in the states). The have a infant warmer in this ICU and we saw three newborns rush by us, one was pretty blue which I would guess had a very low apgar score, wasn't breathing, and was pretty blue. It was pretty neat to see that she was finally resuscitated and was doing well.
That is all for now, I know this is sort of disorganized and may not make much sense, I am sorry for that I hope that you will understand.
More to come later.
It's great to be here, thanksThis is a picture of the Adult ICU, our doctors were consulted about a patient who needed a chest tube. The ICU looked to be about maybe 8 beds. We saw a burn, ingestion, and many other injuries.
4 comments:
Thanks for keeping us up to date with your activities. We are praying for you and all your patients. Bummer that the pictures take so long to load, but that will give you plenty to post about when you get home.
Andy
Rebekah and Rachel were over this morning to collect more parsley for their catipiller.
They said they talked with you last night and were so excited to finally here from you... They are very proud of what you are doing despite the fact they miss you.
Your work is so important. Thank you for sharing the details.
Have a good day 3!
All is now quiet on the homefront...kids are sleeping and I am reading about your day...missing you, but so happy you are doing this. I love you.
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