My thoughts often turn to the men and women who serve at Kalukembe Hospital. Located about 100 miles NE of Lubango, Kalukembe is a typical, low-resource, isolated town on the Angolan savannah. There the disease of poverty are more apparent, and the medical resources are way less than at the Lubango Evangelical Medical Center. […]
Typhoid fever. At this moment I’m caring for a youth with this disease in the highlands of Angola, Africa. The typhoid ruptured six holes in his intestine, and has nearly taken his life. He is of the Ovimbundu people, for whom life has not changed in hundreds of years. The women and children tend
Here at the Evangelical Medical Center of Lubango hospitalized children generally do not do well. Honestly, I doubt this is a reflection on our Center as much as it is a mirror of the nation as a whole. Because of educational, financial, and cultural barriers parents tend to bring their kids for care only as a
Yesterday I was caring for 3 year old child in Emergency here at the Evangelical Medical Center of Lubango. He suffered from malaria and was in respiratory distress. His hemoglobin fell from 10 to 4 in just a few hours – indicating progressive destruction of his blood by the malaria parasite. I had a very
Here, amid the heavy rain showers, in the background I can hear wailing from the Gomez family. I am so very shocked and saddened to discover that their son, my young patient with typhoid fever, abruptly died! Yesterday, 4 days after surgery, his condition appeared to be excellent. He was talking with me and
This morning I was part of the chapel service that the Angolas do here each Thursday. Their singing is amazing, and I find is fascinating to see how they have translated some of songs from English into Portuguese. Sozinho, one of the nurses, gave a presentation from John 11 – the account of Jesus
I rolled out about midnight in response to an urgent call from the hospital. The center sits on a escarpment that over looks the city, and it’s from there I shot one of the pics I share with you. Normally a gorgeous view, but at night the drive up the mountain is treacherous, with
Last night I was listening to an African family sing softly as I examined their young relative with severe abdominal pain. He was deeply jaundiced, so hepatitis was my primary diagnosis. But his abdominal tenderness was steadily increasing. Could this be an intestinal perforation from typhoid fever? Was I bold enough to operate and
This morning I cared for an older woman who care from the bush with an enormous cancer of her cervix. But fortunately she was feeling very little pain. All I could do was to explain to her adult sons that we had little to offer. It was way too late to operate. I hope
Find yourself reluctant to let go a sneeze in public? Understandable, given the nation-wide anxiety surrounding Swine Flu. Feel good when you pin on a pink ribbon? Quite appropriate, given the ubiquitous concern for fighting breast cancer. And isn’t it comforting to know that today’s treatments for heart disease call for stents far more