Cannot believe the End is Near!

So I have been very poor at updating this frequently! My apologies!

I had a very busy week last week. Ended up admitting several children to the hospital, and the parent's weren't very happy about it. They tried convincing me that the kids were okay, and I almost relented, but my sixth sense kicked in and I admitted the children.

The first was a 1 week old baby with jaundice who was discharged home with jaundice and was supposed to follow up with me. The baby's blood type was known, but mother's blood type and Rh factor (rhesus factor, the + or -) were not known. So the baby was potentially set up for problems with having different blood types than mom. Mom was also breastfeeding, and the baby could have had breast feeding jaundice. The third problem was that mom told me that the baby was only breastfeeding about 4 times a day! When asked, the mom said it was because the baby was sleeping the rest of the time. After I raised a stink, the mom started to change her story saying she was feeding more than that... but I just couldn't risk it. The child was admitted and had labs drawn... better to be cautious than cavalier about that.

The other was a 12 year old asthmatic with an exacerbation. He had several nebulized treatments in the A+E (accident and emergency, our ER) and said he was finally feeling better. However, his mother was not going to be able to fill his prescriptions until the next day, so he would be going home without any albuterol or his needed steroids. I had to draw the line and say that when mom got his meds filled, he'd be able to go home the next day, just didn't want him getting home and the exacerbation getting worse.

I've seen a large portion of run-of-the-mill respiratory infections. Rotavirus has hit Port Antonio, and it looks like it's spread to Annoto Bay and Port Maria, as I've seen an increasing amount of acute gastroenteritis.

Still occasionally have some problems understanding accents, but I think I am getting better.

on Friday I gave a small "lunch and learn" presentation on asthma exacerbations and management of asthma in the acute and chronic settings at Port Antonio. A lot of the doctors and nurses from the peds ward were there. They asked great questions and seemed to enjoy it. I hope it was useful. They did ask that the next group prepare some topic dealing with nephritis/nephritic/nephrotic syndrome, as they've seen an increase in those patient's recently.

I would definitely recommend to future volunteers to get a presentation done before you come down!

Will try to update later this week.