July 25th, 2016 by INMED

Wow! Only one week left of the rotation! I don’t know how time has gone so fast. Week three was a bit different that the past two weeks. Monday I worked with Dr. Stockley and it was a normal day, full of tropical diseases and general practice. Then Tuesday and Wednesday Ashley and I actually took off and went to Jinja to spend two days outside of Kampala. Don’t worry I made up the work days this weekend.

But Jinja was a ton of fun. Tuesday morning we were picked up in Kampala by the Nile River Explorers bus and taken about 2 hours to Jinja. We spent Tuesday white water rafting on the Nile River which was absolutely amazing. Tuesday started off with a general introduction and safety briefing and then we got fitted with life jackets and helmets. Then we were given a Rolex and a bowl of fruit and put on a bus for another 45 minutes and taken to the starting point for rafting. We had an amazing guide, and he let us practice everything we needed to in the calm waters before the first rapid. Then the white water rafting began! As we approached the first of 8 Rapids, we watched another raft go down the first one. They went over this huge wave and then just disappeared and we all panicked because we had no idea how big the drop off was. Then it was our turn. We followed the guides instructions to paddle hard, get down and lean right, paddle some more, and then get down and hold on. We made it through the rapids without losing anyone and once we were passed it, we turned and looked back. Turns out we had pretty much just rafted down a 12 foot rock wall and survived!

The rest of the day was a mix of adrenaline pumping Rapids with lots of calm water in between. There were even areas in which we could jump out and swim around. I just couldn’t believe I was swimming in the NIle. And yes, I do plan to get tested for Schistosomiasis in a couple weeks and to take the treatment as recommended, because the Nile definitely has Bilharziasis! We did a total of 8 Rapids and only flipped the raft over 3 times, which I thought was fairly decent since all of the Rapids were between a grade 3 and grade 5.

After a full day of rafting we had a buffet barbecue with drinks and then got on the bus to go back to the lodge. Ashley and I opted to spend the night on the NIle River Explorers river view camp which was this amazing camp site compound right on a bluff over looking the Nile. We stayed in a river view safari tent, and I actually was able to go to a yoga class on a platform over looking the river for sunset. Everything was just beautiful and amazing.

Wednesday we just spent the day in town in Jinja getting some good food and visiting some of the craft and souvenir shops before we caught the bus home. In true African style the 80 km bus ride ended up taking 4.5 hours. Needless to say we were exhausted after a great two days and did NOT want to go back to work Thursday. But we did manage to finish up the week at the Surgery.

Thursday we used Ketamine and set a woman’s leg that she had fractured. I had never experienced ketamine use like that so it was nerve wracking but really cool. Then Friday was just another day with Stockley learning about tropical diseases. Friday we got off a bit early and went to the craft market in Makindye and I loaded up on gifts for everyone back home.

Then I worked this weekend and also prepared the presentation that I am going to give for the CME this coming Thursday. It was nice to work on the weekend because the patient load was less and I got to talk about the cases more with the doctors that I was working with. It is going to make for a long week though because I will be working 8 full days in a row. The worst part of being on the equator is that the sun goes down at 7 every day no matter what. So working till 6 or 7 and then the ride home, means that I am always home after dark so the day consists of pretty much only work and nothing else. It’s hard to get any work done or a workout in. But if that is one of my only complaints, I’m doing pretty dang awesome! So far I have loved it here, and I am so glad I am staying in Claire’ house. There is a great social aspect of the house and we all look out for one another and it really has been on of the best parts of my trip so far.

One of the other things that I have really enjoyed is learned about all the different countries processes in which they train doctors. The US system is about 3 years longer than any other country I have talked about and that is really frustrating to me. It is also by far the most expensive education. In the UK, it is only 5 years after graduation, and only 9,000 pounds a year for those 5 years. That is almost the same price as 1 year of medical school for me. It has been really enlightening to learn about all the different countries processes.