8:40 pm, May 15, KMH

Blood draw for a rapid HIV test
(no worries, no HIPAA in Africa)

Today has been a pretty cool day. I started in male ward "with" Muchaya but not really. I was placed in charge of Male Ward B, as well as blood draws and dressing changes for the entire unit. I didn't know where to start. Thankfully, Naomi showed up and helped me do blood draws. She took me off dressing changes and I ended up taking BPs for the entire unit instead. One thing that was rather sobering was the fact that the large adult BP cuff was much too big for most of the men's arms. Sometimes it wrapped around twice. We ended up getting one from peds.




I was able to see Dzindza again. He asked how I was doing and said he had been worrying about me. He also asked why my face was long and told me that I was too big for being 21 years old.

After tea time (a standard here. Dzingdza was shocked that we do not have it in the States.) Naomi reassigned me to peds ward. I worked with Gijimani, who was also in her first day of peds. You could hardly tell, she is so on top of things. I was able to give meds IM and IVP, as well as PO and per nebulizer. I reconstituted and diluted. I saw a couple of hydrocephalus babies as well as one with myelomeningocele ("meningomyelocele"), a baby who was HIV+ and two who probably have TB. One kid who we gave an IM shot to had kwashiorkor so bad that he looked like a burn victim because his skin was peeling off. The hardest thing was making kids cry.

Melita (center) and Judy (right) having a traditional Zimbabwe meal 

Tonight we went over to Melita's for dinner. Her stew and Judy's homemade bread were delicious. Then I went over to Kiersten's for her nursing student Bible study. Gijimani had invited me and Muchaya was there. Because some of the girls are going to Harare for psych, we ended up talking about demons, and the difference between oppression and suppression, and schizophrenia and depression, and whether a Christian can be possessed, and what being bought by the blood of Christ means, and neurotransmitters. Its cool how Christ and medicine can be common denominators. I felt like I learned so much tonight.