All Good Things Must come to an end

Sadly I'm down to my last days. With the interns here my days have been full with clinic, answering their questions, teaching them, and working on posters for health education talks i've been giving once a week and Las Pitas clinic and Sedano clinic. Monday I set my record for the most patients I've seen in a 3-4 hour half day (we comute 2+ hours each way to get to the clinic, so that doesn't leave us much time to see all the patients who've also walked 3-4 hours to get there and then wait for their turn): I saw 20 patients at Las PItas and Lexie (the nurse) saw the other 3. Today we had 45 patients, but Dr. Juliette was with us. I got there late with the interns and the driver for the interns, Joel, because the vehicle he drives wouldn't start this morning (like usual) and they finally had to wait on the mechanic. I gave my 30-45 minute health discussion/class/talk in Spanish and then joined Dr. Juliette in seeing patients. I think I may have seen 15 patients, and she saw the rest.
Tomorrow is my last day to work and then I fly out of Tegus on Friday at noon. Then back to the real world. I fly into Houston on friday and have to be in Tulsa by 6pm Sunday for the beginning of my internship/residency orientation. At some point (probably Sunday) i plan to pass through Ft. Worth to pick up the last of my stuff from my place in Ft Worth to complete my move up to Tulsa. :(
And life goes on.
On a happy note, I've been running at the ranch every day since i've been here. I've only missed 2 days since I've been here. Katie, one of the missionaries has been running with me too. And today two of the intern guys (Bryan and Chanler) ran with me. Yeah for running! :)

Multi-tasking

I'm having a great time. my spanish is getting a lot better and i'm getting more comfortable with treating patients with the limited medicines we have. i now have "interns" working with me. most are premed or pre-nursing, so i'm talking to the patient in spanish, translating in english (because the two/three I've been working with this week don't speak any spanish), teaching the pre-med students about the condition/disease we're seeing while writing down my H&P note (which has history of present illness, physical exam, diagnosis and treatment) in spanish. All i can say is that its a good thing that everyones so patient around here (I saw 6 patients and did all this in 2-3 hours or so today, while at the same time Dr. Juliet (the Honduran doctor) saw the other 32 patients. :) Oh well. I"m doing my best. Good thing I've got a great God who likes working through losers like me! :)

The interns arrived two saturdays ago. there are 13 of them and they're spread out through out the various projects through out the week. They're here for 10 weeks.

Some tropical storm just came through. It's rainy season here, so normally its sunny during the day and rains in the late afternoon/evening. While the store came through it rained hard for like 72+ hours straight. All the rivers were flooded, and it was near impossible to get anywhere. Even the airport was closed for 3+ days in Tegusigalpa. But the sun came out today and yesterday for what seems like the first time in a long time...and with it the heat :) You can't win :)

The consequences of not paying the electricity bill

Evidently our land owner didn't pay the electricity bill. The consequence is that the electric company cut the electric wires to the house.... welcome to Honduras. Oh well. I can survive with candles. The only downer is that the light bulb that warms our shower water (ie. our Honduran water heater) runs on electricity, as well as the water pump that pumps water up to the cistern on the roof and down to us. So we have no water. Oh well. Meredith asked one of the Mission lazarus workers to reattach it today. So hopefully we'll have electricity tonight.

Mountain Medicine

So my current "job" is to go with the medical team each day. Tuesday we're at the coast in Sudeno. The rest of the days were in the mountains in Las Pitas. The Honduran doctor, Dr. Juliette, is with us Tuesdays and Wednesdays. The rest of the days its just Lexi (the Honduran nurse), Aliro (our Honduran driver), the local preacher and local workers depending on the location. When Dr. Juliette is with us I'm going to attempt health education to the people. When she's not I help see patients. My spanish is improving rapidly--i can understand "mountain" spanish alot better (I'm not sure if they just don't enunciate as well or what. Meredith (one of my American roommates who's been helping run this place for over a year) says its cuz they don't have teeth.)

Hope all is well.

Dios le bendiga!

The Walk and the Wait

I went with the medical team yesterday to Las Pitas, which consists of a Honduran doctor, a Honduran nurse and a Honduran driver. Along the way we picked up the Honduran preacher and song leader for the village we were going to.
In the states there always seem to be some patients who are impatient, and who complain that they had to wait in the clinic for an hour to see the doctor or in the ER for 8+ hours. In Las Pitas many of the patients had walked 2-4 hours up a steep hill to arrive 1-2 hours for the team to arrive, and then continued to wait until their turn without complaining.

Rainy Season

Evidently rainy season has just begun here in Honduras. Normally it runs from May through September, but ended in August last year so its been real dry recently (so I'm told by Meredith one of the workers/directors here at Mission Lazarus)...So far it's rained three of the three days I've been here.