Surgery Tuesday

Arm Surgery! Today we made sure to arrive at the hospital just before nine to head in to watch a surgery done by our favorite doctor! He is an orthopedic surgeon from Korea and literally raised the funds to build the new surgical theatre he now works in (including the equipment!!!). The patient was a young man who had fractured his radius over three months ago and had never been able to get it set properly. This caused the bone to grow back wrong with a lot of pain. In a nut shell, the doctor sliced open his arm and re-broke and chiseled down the bone for a perfect fit. After confirming the puzzle piece like fit, he screwed in a metal plate to ensure proper growth. It was interesting to see the procedure and how the team handled limited sterility. Soren and I even got to help out a little by adjusting the surgical light and pouring some cleaning fluid! After we’d seen enough we went out to work on the suction machine again. Again, we spent the whole afternoon fidgeting with the motor to see if there was any chance we could get it up and running. One of our coordinators came to visit and help us out and then headed to have a delicious late lunch with all of my housemates. Soren and I then headed to TCDC to drop off our hiking clothes to be washed since they got so dirty on the climb! But then… both of us fell asleep on the dala dala and ended up missing our stop so by the time we got back, the laundry place had closed! It’s times like these we can tell we’re really exhausted. After that, I headed back to the hospital before dark. I wanted to hang out with my favorite nurse on her night duty in the preemie room. Aubs decided to join so it was nice to have someone to walk with. When we got there the power was out AND the hospital wasn't running the generator. Since the heaters weren't running all the babies were wrapped up tight in their kongas, looking snug and warm. Luckily, the power turned on after about 20 minutes. It was nice to sit and chat and really see what it's like to be a nurse there. I can't imagine regularly being in charge of 29 babies (I counted) all by myself!