This is the first installment of our regular "Report from Rwanda" feature, written by our friend and regular Maternally Yours contributor Dr. Washington Hill, who is spending eleven months in Rwanda, Africa, as part of a Clinton Foundation through Duke University.
This has been a great week. Our goal and that of the team here is to improve health care in this country but being teachers of medical students, nurses, midwives and OB-Gyns. There are representatives fron 10 universities in many other specialties and subspecialties. There is a lot that can be done here. This is all possible through a consortium of many agencies including the Clinton Foundation.
This week started on Friday night when I arrived. Pauline had been here 6 months teaching in a District and poor hospital nursing students. She was a good "advance party" and had everything in place to live in an apartment. She has made sure I don't fall and break a hip!
I am working with a MFM from Yale at the referral hospital. We get all kinds of patients from the district hospitals.Just this week we received patients with postpartum hemorrhage, twins. preeclampsia, breast cancer, HIV, pulmonary embolism etc. That is just week 1. There was one maternal death from ruptured liver from preeclampsia.
We are all starting with the basics in improving health care. Stop that bleeding. High BP and low platelets can be deadly.
Today is Saturday so we traveled to southern Rwanda to the Nyungwe Rain Forest. Simply beautiful hilly country. And od course there is a light rain.
Weekends are for travel and relaxation as the teaching work is hard during the week. We run morning report and there are 40 students, residents and others from around the world. Then ward rounds.
Hope that gives you a good idea of what we are all doing here.
Do we miss anything?
Not yet.
See ya,
WCH
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