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Apr 13
2008
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home visitsPosted by juliebriggs in Untagged |
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In the past few weeks I have had the chance to do a couple of home visits to patients who cannot come to the clinic. The first was qith a nurse from the clinic in the place were she lives, a lady had had a stroke and they could not bring her to the clinic. She had no family and some people from the community were looking after her, all I could do was give them some advice on how to look after her but you know they were doing it all already and its amazing how instinct takes over when you haven't been taught what to do.
The next was a little boy who lives just across the road, he is 8 but his body is the size of a three year old. He was born normal and then at 6 months he had a fever, something if your baby had at home you would take straight to the doctor and because of the fever it left a lot of damage in his brain. He cannot move or talk and can only eat liquids yet he was a very content little boy and smiled the whole time we were there. Even though he has never been outside and some of the people in the community probably do not even know he is there, it was lovely to see how happy and content he was but very sad at the same time. It was so obvious the family take very good care of him, so again it was just advice on how to prevent complications.
Treating patients in their own homes is completely different than in the clinic, you see where the patients are coming from, how it isn't easy for them to do some things in their house which I have asked them to do, for example maybe I ask them to do an exercise using a chair but perhaps they don't have a chair. It is very humbling and eye opening to see how they live. But good for me at the same time to see that.
Also my wee friend Carlos has been visiting everyday, he just comes into my room just to say hi, to play and he loves sitting down to draw. He is 7 and has never been to school yet so he cannot write or read simply because his auntie who looks after him (both his parents are dead) doen't have the money. He has been asking me if I can put him in school because he really wants to go, so I spoke to our missionary here who runs starfish kids (the child sponsership programme OMS has to pay for education) to see if we could get him signed up for school. So she said yes and he is going to start school in september which is wonderful. Also with startfish they get a meal each day and have to go to church each sunday so it is not only education the kids get but a meal and a chance to hear the gospel each week which is brilliant.
I don't know if you have heard on the news but there has been some trouble in Port au Prince, the price of food is rising rapidly especially the price of rice which is a staple food here and the haitians eat it everyday but it is so expensive they cannot afford to buy it and the people are going hungry. So please pray for the country as a whole, for the price of food to go down and that there won't be alot of trouble because of this.
Thank you for your ongoing prayers, continue to remember me. You can pray for my work in the clinic with patients, for opportunites to share God's love with people and encourage those who already know God. Pray that as I am in the second half of my time here that people who really need physio will come to the clinic so I can help them while I am still here
The next was a little boy who lives just across the road, he is 8 but his body is the size of a three year old. He was born normal and then at 6 months he had a fever, something if your baby had at home you would take straight to the doctor and because of the fever it left a lot of damage in his brain. He cannot move or talk and can only eat liquids yet he was a very content little boy and smiled the whole time we were there. Even though he has never been outside and some of the people in the community probably do not even know he is there, it was lovely to see how happy and content he was but very sad at the same time. It was so obvious the family take very good care of him, so again it was just advice on how to prevent complications.
Treating patients in their own homes is completely different than in the clinic, you see where the patients are coming from, how it isn't easy for them to do some things in their house which I have asked them to do, for example maybe I ask them to do an exercise using a chair but perhaps they don't have a chair. It is very humbling and eye opening to see how they live. But good for me at the same time to see that.
Also my wee friend Carlos has been visiting everyday, he just comes into my room just to say hi, to play and he loves sitting down to draw. He is 7 and has never been to school yet so he cannot write or read simply because his auntie who looks after him (both his parents are dead) doen't have the money. He has been asking me if I can put him in school because he really wants to go, so I spoke to our missionary here who runs starfish kids (the child sponsership programme OMS has to pay for education) to see if we could get him signed up for school. So she said yes and he is going to start school in september which is wonderful. Also with startfish they get a meal each day and have to go to church each sunday so it is not only education the kids get but a meal and a chance to hear the gospel each week which is brilliant.
I don't know if you have heard on the news but there has been some trouble in Port au Prince, the price of food is rising rapidly especially the price of rice which is a staple food here and the haitians eat it everyday but it is so expensive they cannot afford to buy it and the people are going hungry. So please pray for the country as a whole, for the price of food to go down and that there won't be alot of trouble because of this.
Thank you for your ongoing prayers, continue to remember me. You can pray for my work in the clinic with patients, for opportunites to share God's love with people and encourage those who already know God. Pray that as I am in the second half of my time here that people who really need physio will come to the clinic so I can help them while I am still here
