Sunday 27th October 2013

So it's been a while. Partly that has been because not very much has happened, just the day to day clinic work, some patients sicker than others, some days longer than others, and partly because I wanted to wait until I had finally made up my mind what exactly it is that I want to do. So I made up my mind last week, and resigned on Monday. I had always planned to see out the year contract, but then, of course, the unforeseen happened, and as I mentioned in my last post, I fell in love, and all that changed. So now I will stay until Xmas is over, and embark on the next adventure, and see where that leads me.

Now, of course, the search begins to find my replacement, and I've been sifting through CVs wondering how I can explain the reality of being here, while still filling my post .

The clinic has been quite busy, and this week I evacuated a poorly malaria patient, who luckily has insurance, and was able to be flown out of here at the earliest opportunity (which happened to be a good 20 hours after he arrived in clinic, thanks to the airport being shut overnight). The following day we admitted a sick local girl, who was really very very sick, with untreated malaria. She had kidney failure, liver failure, hardly any red blood cells left thanks to the malaria parasites invading them all, and needed a blood transfusion, dialysis and intensive care - none of which are available in this country. Her family were not rich, and could not afford the money necessary to get her evacuated to Nairobi (the nearest place that could do those things), so took her instead to the local hospital in the hope that they could at least do a "person to person" transfusion, in order to get her well enough to stand at least. This would give her some chance of getting on a commercial flight the following day. I very much doubt that happened. It is the harshness of these realities that I find most difficult to take here. It is something that we, in the UK take so much for granted, but here is the difference between life and death . If I take nothing else away from my time here, it will be a renewed faith in the NHS, despite the best efforts of the British Press, and a sharpened sense of perspective.

On a lighter note, went to a Halloween Party last night by the Nile, where the first band was a Gangsta Rap outfit from Kenya, rapping about, amongst other odd things, "Disabled Rights", and encouraging them to "rise up" - pure Juba.

So I have 4 weeks left until I go on leave, then 2 weeks back here until my contract ends. Then...well I'm going to try a bit of flight nursing, repatriating sick folk back to the UK, and a bit of agency nursing, and just enjoy being a nurse again, without all the people management and logistics that clutter up my day here.

I have met lots of very interesting, and very odd people here in the 6 months I've been away, and had experiences that I will never have again, and I regret none of it.

Onwards and upwards to the next adventure......