Conclusion of Week 1!

Hi everyone! It has been a good week or so since I have updated, and I have fallen a solid 3 weeks behind! In order for me to catch everyone up, I am going to give the speed version of the events of the last three weeks, and if anyone cares for more details, I have pictures of EVERYTHING and a small written journal I have been keeping in order to jog my memory. I also will unlikely have time to write more than maybe one post before I leave for Cape Town on the 31^st, so let’s get down to it!

END WEEK 1:

I left off with brief explanations of the earlier part of my week at St Mary’s. Over the course of the first week, I travelled between the various areas of St. Marys. I spent Monday in OB/GYN, where I saw vaginal suturing post-delivery. The delivery system is crazy at St. Marys, women are in and out in 4 hours! They literally make the women sit in the chairs until they are 3 inches dilated, then take them to the back to start the delivery. Monday was probably my least favorite day, OB at St. Marys was definitely not a boys area. On Tuesday, Leanna and I spent the day in Ithemba, the HIV/AIDS clinic. We walked into Ithemba and there were lines of chairs in every room and along the hallway, all filled with people who were HIV positive. Ithemba is a clinic where people that qualify for HAART (Highly active anti-retroviral therapy) can get it free of charge. Unfortunately, in order to qualify for HAARTs the person has to have a CD4 cell count of under 200. A CD4 count of 200 is defined by the World Health Organization as the level at which a person is susceptible to opportunistic infections, most everyone calls this point AIDS. The ventilation in Ithemba was also bad, requiring us to wear masks as we helped the nurses take vitals and screen patients to the drug regiment areas. I spent Wednesday in MOPD (medical outpatient department) with an extremely sharp older lady called Sister Pilay. Basically it consisted of me sitting in on consultations while she either treated and prescribed medications for patients or sent them to one of the two doctors working. She also included me in the differentials, asking me if I recognized different symptoms and how to spot them. She also showed me what to look for in determining cases of pediatric HIV and showed me how to palpate the different lymph nodes. Finally, I got some excellent experience listening to lung sounds and actually got to hear crepitation! The only day that might have been better than Wednesday was Thursday, where Marjon and I travelled out to a REMOTE area called the Kinswani in the valleys past Durban. Getting there was like a thrill ride, our driver literally hurtled down these dirt roads along a mountain side and the whole time I was gripping the seat in front of me with one hand and holding my camera with the other. After getting to the valley and literally driving through a couple fields, we arrived. The people of the Kinswani live in mud yurt-like structures with sheet metal roofs called huts, where there is no running water, nor electricity. The people live purely off the land, getting money for the sale of food they grow on their land. I got some incredible photos and look forward to finding a way to upload them for all of you guys. I spent Friday in the Pediatric department and saw lots of burn, TB-related respiratory/meningitis, malnutrition, and broken bones cases. The pictures explain these a lot better than I can, so stay tuned.

STILL SORTING OUT PICTURE ALBUMS!

Week 1: St. Marys at Kwazulu-Natal

Where to start??? If I could sum up my first week in South Africa, I would use HURRICANE. Every day and night was busy, and every night I came home and promptly fell asleep. When I say that I am talking 6am until at least 8pm (often later), and repeating the next day.... for six straight days.

To start from the beginning.....

SUNDAY:
Met our driver, an extremely pleasant and heavily accented Zulu man named Roy, who got lost taking us to our house in Woodlands, Durban. My host family is wonderful, and consists of two sisters and two brothers and a single mom. My host moms name is Angel, a big bustling Zulu lady who runs everyone around, cooks, cleans, occasionally does laundry, and somehow finds time to run her own nutritional supplements company. She speaks English quite well, but sometimes she randomly starts laughing at things I say. My two sisters are 22yo Tobilae (Toh-bee-lay), and 12yo Nosipho (No-see-poh). Tobilae suffered a CVA (stroke) when she was 12, and is unable to speak anything other than Zulu and very limited English. Nosipho is a lot of fun as well, and thinks I am crazy for putting cold milk on cereal. THESE PEOPLE HAVE NEVER HEARD OF KETCHUP OH MAN. My two brothers are 17yo Sifiso (Sfee-soh), and 1yr8mo Blessing (Boy). The adventures with Sfiso are too numerous to count, and I will be relaying many of them in future posts to come. Boy is the cutest little kid and he always steals my flip flops and walks around with them. On his feet. How he gets around with them, which are almost literally half his height, is pretty incredible. I'll post pictures soon. Everyone speaks Zulu, and I am slowly picking up words and phrases. I will have to post audio sometime, they make clicks and hisses and weird noises with words and letters and it seriously took like a week to get used to. Leanna was actually taken aback with someone talking to her in Zulu who kept making 'kissing noises' at her until we realized that it was just part of the language. To say the least, it has been interesting.

MONDAY:
Today was our first day at St. Marys Hospital at Mariannhill. St. Marys is a religious hospital run by Sisters. There are few doctors and the sisters do most of the work that doctors would normally do. There are two operating rooms at the hospital, a pediatric ward, an OPD, a HIV/AIDS clinic, and a OB/GYN ward. There are also general wards, and some rehab areas.
NOTE: Let me give you the run down on ranks in South African medical personnel. Doctors: self-explanatory. The second rank is not nurses, but Sisters. Sisters are roughly equivalent in authority to American nurses. Sisters are always clearly marked by a maroon-colored shoulder placard. The third rank are nurses, which are equivalent to CNA's and technicians. The knowledge of the doctors here is really really widespread in the fact that some could probably be physicians in America, and others not so much. The South African education system allows students to enter a 5 year medical school right out of high school at 18, then follow up with two years of internship, then one year of community service. Doctors are certified at this point, but can choose to specialize in a particular area by returning to school of varying lengths, which they call residency. It's a little confusing, but I always get shocked looks when I tell people how long it takes American students to finish med school and residency! 'Crazy!' is a term I have heard quite often.
Returning to the story, we pretty much got a tour and got dropped off in different areas for the day. Mine was in OB/GYN and the first thing I saw was vaginal suturing post-delivery. It was really intense in the fact that they don't use local anesthesia and that the patient was screaming in Zulu. What was even more interesting was the surroundings, it was like walking back in time 25 years. I counted maybe 5 ECG's in the whole hospital, medications were left on shelves in torn up styrofoam cases, and the beds were tarnished sheet metal covered by tattered cushions. In the delivery area, women were in and out within four hours. Like drive in, wait in the chairs until they were I think 5cm dilated, then taken in back and prepared for pregnancy. It was insane! Like women would be sitting in waiting area in contractions, some yelling, and the sisters would be like meh, what can we do? The head Sister in that area was Sr. Thusi (Too-see), an efficient Zulu woman who at first appeared cold and unwelcoming before slowly warming to me when I persisted in following and asking questions. Later on, we got picked up by Roy and went to the university to get ID cards and register for internet/email. This took forevvver and then we were missing a paper and had to find some guy to make it, then his computer crashed so he had to do it manually, so we couldnt get it till later and just walked around for a while until we went home. We got home around 7:30, and had our first official night with the families, watching movies and eating chicken curry until falling asleep.

The rest of the week, and photos, to come tomorrow!

I'm late for a meeting!

Cheers,

Chris

Quick Update!

Hey everyone! I snuck away from Safari weekend for a few mins to write this letter telling you guys to expect a big update!! I am currently in St. Lucia on safari, and can't wait to tell you guys about the first week at the deeply Zulu St. Marys Clinic and the second week at GJ Crookes in the beautiful beach town of Scottburgh! Expect the first post of the first two weeks by Tuesday, with pictures and a story about safari weekend by weeks end.

Hope everyone is well, and thanks for tuning in!

-Chris

The Flight To Durban.

I'll break down the flight for you guys in 2 words: 46 hours. (Including layovers). It's neither easy for me nor fair for you for me to leave it at that, so the first phase of my LONG travel adventure started at PDX and temporarily ended in Las Vegas, Nevada....

I walked out of the plane tunnel and I kid you not, the first thing I saw was SLOT MACHINES! Realizing that I had 10 hours before my next flight to New York, I figured I would go down to the strip and see what Vegas had to offer. But getting down to the strip was an adventure in itself. I decided to take the buses down to the strip and encountered some interesting characters on the way! And everyone had a different way of explaining the transit system and where and when I had to be at a place to make it back in time. After switching buses three times I found myself outside the Flamingo, with a miraculous view of Caesars and the Paris Casino. I LOVED Caesars! I wandered around the great casinos and Pure nightclub for at least 2 hours, and can't wait to go back and experience it in all its glory as a guest and during a time in which everything is open. (I arrived after 11pm, so most of the shows and attractions had already started or were closed). I'll sum up the rest of my experience on the strip real quick-like: Paris: didn't bother. New York New York: hooker central, seediest place ever. Planet Hollywood: Nice atmosphere, tiny casino, few attractions. MGM Grand: Biggest letdown of the night, only two bars I could go, long lines- one I actually decided to wait for couldn't get in because I was wearing flip flops.

By this point I was cranky, sore and tired, and walked to the Luxor for a cab back to the airport.

When I got back to the airport, I took a 2 hour nap and then got my stuff out of a locker and waited to board the plane. That was when the pilot got on the PA and said that we were going to be leaving 30 minutes late, and when we finally did leave, we had an 8 plane queue to get out of the airport. It took a little under an hour and a half to get through the queue and wheels up.... Problem: I had a 2 hour and 6 minute layover in New York..... I arrived at JFK with FOUR MINUTES to catch my connecting flight to Dakar, Senegal. Imagine some guy sprinting through 16 terminals carrying a duffel over his shoulder dragging a mini-suitcase behind him through a packed corridor and food court. Yeah, I was that guy. Somehow I made it! But my luggage didn't...

Despite the setbacks in Vegas and NYC, a Cape Town doctor and myself ended up getting a front row three person row all to ourselves so we had massive leg room and arm space, and myself getting excellent company for the 19 hours it took to go from NYC to Cape Town. Once in Cape Town, I took a terrible flight to Durban and am pretty sure my on-flight prayers helped that pilot land that plane. Moral of this paragraph: Don't fly Mango.

MORAL OF THIS STORY: Pay the extra $50 for less connections and layovers.

Coming soon: THE FIRST DAY, WHERE IS MY LUGGAGE, and PHOTOS!!!

Stay tuned!

Welcome to my South African adventure!

Hello, my name is Chris Moser and I am going to South Africa for the fall term of my senior year at Oregon State University. This blog is going to serve as a journal of my endeavors as well as a site for information on my experience and ways to get in contact with me. Please feel free to send me an email with questions not addressed on this page. Let's get down to it!


Where I am going:

I will be spending my first 5 weeks in Durban, South Africa. Durban is a large, fairly modern city with a population of between 4 and 5 million people. Durban has a warm, and very humid climate with the fabulous Indian ocean and great surfing! It also has a significant Indian influence, Durban has the largest Indian population in the world outside of India . It was the banning of the Indian indentured laborers from the purchase of land in Durban in 1922 that was one of the first laws to sow the seeds of the apartheid legislation that was to follow.

The last 5 weeks will be spent in Cape Town, South Africa. Cape Town is the second largest city in South Africa, behind Johannesburg, with a population of 3.5 million. Cape Town was originally developed by the Dutch East India Company as a victualling (supply) station for Dutch ships sailing to Eastern Africa, India, and the Far East more than 200 years before the construction of the Suez Canal in 1869 (wikipedia). It is the largest tourist hub in South Africa and is widely regarded as one of the most beautiful cities in the world.


What I will be doing:

Simply put, I will be taking part in a medical internship. The rotation sites in Durban are more focused on public health issues and HIV/AIDS while the sites in Cape Town are more clinically-focused. Durban will experience a wider range of health facilities including rural health care, hospices, teaching hospitals and public and private clinics. In Cape Town, I will get to spend time primarily within two major urban hospitals and associated township clinics, getting familiar with the different wards within these two large medical systems. I will probably opt to spend most of my time in the Emergency and Orthopedic departments as these are my current top selections for medical school.


Where I will be staying:

I will be staying with different homestay families over the course of the internship. These are people that graciously have opened their homes to study abroad students, and the first family I will be staying with in Durban is a single mother household with three children. I am not sure of the second family I will be staying with, but will post that information upon receiving it.


When I leave and how long I will be gone for:

I leave for South Africa on Wednesday, September 24th, and will return to the United States on December 11th.


How to get in contact with me:

I can be reached either by email or mobile phone, but the number is a South African number and I recommend purchasing a phone card from www.nobelcom.com as it is much cheaper than normal cell phone carrier international long distance rates. You can also get in touch with my mom to call me, as she will likely have multiple cards. Due to the moving nature of the internship, I will not have an address to have things sent to, but feel free to send me yours and maybe you will hear back!

My email: moserch@onid.orst.edu
My cell phone: TBD
My moms email: Artzymom2@hotmail.com
My moms cell phone: avail upon request.

STAY TUNED TO THIS BLOG FOR FUTURE UPDATES! I WILL SEE YOU ALL IN 3 MONTHS!!