In The Clouds.....

A week in Santa Maria De Jesus......

My final week (for now) beckons......




An amazing experience this week as I joined a team of doctors and medical students from the USA working at a clinic in a village high up the slopes of Volcan Agua. So everyday we jumped into a bus and made our way up to the village arriving early to set up for the day. The clinic gave the team a few rooms for consultation, and one room to set up the pharmacy which is where









I was working along with Lesley and the team leader Joanne. While we set up the pharmacy, the other team members got themselves organised. First however was the huge task of organising the patients, and taking down their information, this was done by the medical students as well as our bus driver!!
The suitcases brought by the team contained bags with dental care kits as well as vitamins and other goodies. Every patient received one of these packs as well as any medication needed prescribed by the doctor. We also had lots of goodies to give away to the children, including hats and toys. The pharmacy organised, I looked around and prepared myself for the first patient. Lesley and I were to label and give out the packs while Joanne checked the medication and gave us instructions, which were then relayed to the patients. WOW!!!! Soon we were really busy as families of 5 and 6, mostly women with their children, arrived all at once ready to receive their individual bag of goodies and gifts. I soon found myself counting pills, making up bottles of antibiotics, mixing lotions and measuring medicine and labelling and packaging them ready to hand over. Joanne checked and instructed Lesley and I as the patients presented themselves with their papers. It was non stop as late afternoon descended and the light faded, outside and inside….. we had no light / electricity in the room. We finally packed up around 5.30pm before heading back to Antigua. Exhausted but happy with the way the first day had gone.
We had seen over 135 patients on that first day....…


















The people of Santa Maria De Jesus and other villages surrounding it are very poor, living in very basic accommodation , usually in the fields and with no running water or proper sanitation. The families are often large with at least 5-6 children and day to day survival is the priority, personal hygiene a luxury. Medical care is rarely sought as it takes time and is often expensive. The men rarely take time off, working in the fields for over 8 hours each day, the boys always helping, so the majority of the patients we saw were women and girls. It was amazing to see very









young women of 20-22 with 4 or more children with the prospect of having even more. Family planning is not an option for many. Some patients we saw had not sought any medical help for a long time and had to be referred to our hospital here in Antigua, we don’t really know if anything can be done for them or indeed if they will follow up our advice and actually contact the hospital, but we hope as some are really seriously ill. Some mothers returned again and again each day during the week, with a new batch of children. One woman arrived with 7 girls, not all of them ill, but all wanting a pack and a free gift.... who can challenge bad headaches and backaches?
As the week progressed news soon spread that we were giving out free packs and medical care and the queues got longer and longer, the work harder, the hours longer… .









It was tough trying to cope with the increasing number of patients, the noise from the waiting families and children, the babies, the various body odours and conditions ( lots of head lice and scabies), old patients who could not hear struggling just to get a pack. And of course the expectations………. Along with the medical cases we also encountered cases of physical abuse, neglect and violence. It was tough. By the end of the week we had averaged around 156 patients a day, the last day we saw over 200 patients!!
In many ways it was the toughest week but it had its highlights as we saw children laughing, trotting out with their new hats or toys and lotions, new born babies alert and smiling, and all of them thanking us for our care

and generosity.









I enjoyed every minute of it!
My thanks to Joanne for her care, advice and support and for enabling me to have this experience. I never thought I would be a pharmacist… even if it was for a week!!!!… Thank you!
My hero of the week..Lesley…who spoke to nearly every single person who came to the centre providing explanations for the medication and answering questions…..and while being firm when necessary, kept her humour! FAB!!!!
Antigua
I missed seeing my beautiful Perla......


Sadly the final blog entry next week....

Enjoy
Adios amigos
Goodnight
Xxx