Big Needles, Bad Food, and Blocked IV Lines

Thursday, October 14

I carried my Bible and hymnal up to the hospital to see if we would be having our Thursday night study. The only two staff present were Cherilyn and Dr. Trixy, who were busy with a consult. Since I really had nowhere else to be, I busied myself with herding curious kids out of the exam room, and looking at pictures in an EMT book. While I was absentmindedly scanning the chapter on airways, I happened to glance up and see Cyril galumph through the double doors into the hospital. My stomach felt like someone had tied it in knots. After the initial pleasantries, I slipped into the nurse’s station, telling him that Cherilyn needed my help filling a syringe. He apparently thought we took too long because he came and poked his head in the room looking for me.  Cherilyn told him we were busy and helped him close the door. I ended up giving the injection, and taking the leftover medication to the fridge in hopes that he would see I was busy and go away. He didn’t. Instead, he joined us for Bible study. Since he didn’t bring his own hymnal or Bible, he just had to sit by me and share mine. Which, sharing would have been fine except both my hymnal and Bible have print so small that you have to get your face right in the book to read it. Even though I stretched my arm as far toward him as I could possibly reach, he still felt the need to lean over my char to see. So he had his arm on my arm rest, leaning over me, but facing the other way so he could actually see the hymnal that I held way over in front of him.

 After Bible study I was waiting for Cherilyn to walk back to our room. Cyril came and asked me if I’d received his notes, and what I thought. I told him that, while he was a good writer, I was not interested. “Oh, oh,” He laughed, “I am so sad!” A few seconds of awkward silence… “But you are so beautiful. You really aren’t interested?” “No, I’m really not interested, at all!” At that I picked up my books and marched back to my apartment.

Sabbath, October 16

  I had the day shift at the hospital this Sabbath. I spent most of the morning studying my Bible, and journaling. A little five year old boy came in carrying his little bag of medicine and syringes, so I could give him some shots. I was hoping that I could give him both of his medications in one IV site, so I wouldn’t have to stick him too many times. He watched me with the biggest, saddest eyes as I tied the tourniquet around his arm. As soon as he saw the IV needle, the sad eyes went away, and he started screaming and wiggling, and trying to get away. His brother had to hold him down while I pinned his arm down and stuck him. We still weren’t able to hold him still enough, and the IV blew. The next one I decided to just do IM, since he couldn’t really sit still enough for an IV. When he saw me whip out the IM needle, he just about died. He was screaming at his brother, “no, no! See how big?!?!” We finally got him pinned down so I could stick his thigh, but he let us know that he wasn’t very happy about it.

Sunday, October 17

 The little five year old came back for his second set of injections. This time there were two people accompanying him.  “Good.” I thought to myself, “reinforcements. We’re ready for him now!” But how wrong I was. This time I hardly had  time to tie the tourniquet before he started screaming and trying to get away. I told the brother that he would have to hold him down so I could give the injection. He did his best but still the arm was moving way too much for me to even hope to stick a vein. I went to our apartment and made Cherilyn cut her shower short so she could come and help us hold the patient down. Cherilyn and the brother managed to keep his body mostly still while I tried to hold his arm down. His sister was next to useless and just kept slapping the arm that I was trying to stick, so even if he would have been still enough for me, he hand was between me and him half the time. Finally, after much sweating, and grunting, and holding, and poking on our part, and screaming, and kicking on his part, we got all the medication inside him, and sent him on his way. In retrospect it was a really funny experience, but at the time it was awful! By the time I had finished I was shaking. The few minutes listening to him scream had totally drained me. I was praying that I wouldn’t have to do another injection for a good long time.

Monday, October 18

By the time the little boy came in for his last injection we’d figured it out, and it went pretty smoothly. Fortunately I only had to give the IM. We stretched him out on the bed, then his brother laid across his chest and then put his leg over the little boy’s. He could still kick pretty good, so I caught his feet between my knees. By the time we had him so he couldn’t move, the only part of him that was showing was his thigh where I was going to stick him, and his little feet. He was very happy when I told him that was his last injection and, hopefully, he wouldn’t have to see me again.

Later that day we had two new patients come in, both needing quinine drips right away. About every two minutes, while I was gathering supplies for the IVs, someone would come in the room asking how long it would be, or if I was ready yet. I guess they never figured out that the more they interrupted me, the longer it would take for me to finish what I was doing. Cherilyn was kind enough to come up and help start one of the IVs for me.

Thursday, October 21

Wednesday night a little boy came to the hospital with pneumonia and malaria, so first thing Thursday, I needed to start his second quinine drip. I spiked and hung the new bag, opened the line, but nothing happened. The old bag had stopped running a while ago, so I thought it might have become clogged. I really didn’t want to have to start a new site on him, so I grabbed a syringe and 10 mLs of saline. I tried to flush the line through every port I could find, but still nothing was working. When I had exhausted every trick I could think of and none of them had worked, I decided the only thing left was to re-insert the IV. When I had taken all the tape off, I found the problem; the part of the catheter that stuck out of his arm had shifted and become kinked. I was so relieved that I didn’t have to stick him again! I straightened everything out, taped it back down, and started the drip.

Later that afternoon, one of my patients invited me to join them for lunch. I had politely declined the day before and they seemed a little offended, so I thought I should probably join them this time. She said it was vegetables and yams. Vegetables are always good, and even though I don’t really like yams, I figured I could handle them for one meal. At first the two giant pieces of yam weren’t too bad; they actually tasted like regular potatoes. But the more I ate, the drier they got and the more they tasted like yams. The vegetable was actually just greens, similar to kale, with chunks of fish in it. When it comes to their fish, Cameroonians closely adhere to the adage, “waste not, want not,” and so, eat the whole fish. A fact I had forgotten about, until I shoved a forkful of fins, scales, and bones into my mouth. For those of you who don’t know, I’m a born and raised vegetarian. I can barely choke down a bite of salmon that hardly even tastes like fish anymore; a whole pile of green slimy stuff that tastes like it was scraped off the bottom of the ocean, then mixed with charred fish carcasses is just more than I can take.  I couldn’t chew it up! I tried to swallow it, but I knew that if I swallowed that stuff whole, I’d probably choke to death, right there in the hospital, so I kept chewing. By the end of the meal, all I could do was pray that I didn’t throw up before I got out of the patients room, and try to gag down the last few bites. I think, aside from the sauerkraut when I was two, that was the worst meal I’ve ever had. However, I really appreciated the families generosity.