Mbingo

So today was my first full day at the hospital. Mbingo Bapitst Hospital started in 1952 as a Leprosy settlement. Because of its history it is located about a 45 minute drive from Bamenda, the nearest major population center. Although the hospital itself is isolated, the advantage is it is perched up in the mountains and has a beautiful view of the surrounding mountains and valley from most parts of the complex. Below is a picture taken from the front porch of the house I am staying at. The hospital has since grown and is considered a referral center with people even coming from the Doula, Cameroon's largest city, for consultations and admissions.

My day started at 6:40 am with me being introduced at chapel. I was quite surprised at how many people were there. It must be that all of the hospital staff go, and that there are more hospital staff than I realized. After chapel we have "morning report" in which the on-call resident presents one of the patients that was admitted the previous night. Today was a case of CHF exacerbated by medication non-compliance and alcohol use (did blue medicine follow me to the other side of the world?). After morning report the head social worker took me on a 2 hour tour of the hospital and I was introduced to too many people to remember. Afterwards I went on "rounds" with one of the internal medicine residents (Dr. Jam) and Kara Beth Thompson, a recently graduated FP who is spending two years here working with the residency program. It turns out the women's ward is now "my ward" and I am the "attending." With this realization that I am responsible for this ward I made a beeline for my computer and began researching a couple of the complex cases (what would I do without UpToDate?). Everything is made more difficult by the fact that #1) I don't know which medications are available and which ones are not #2) I don't know which lab tests are available #3) although I do speak English, I don't speak Pidgin English and #4) I will have to take care of pediatric patients. Fortunately the resident I am working with has been a general practitioner for several years and I'm sure with any questions I can always ask one of the family practice doctors that have been here for a while. At 3pm every day we have a lecture for the residents. I will be the one giving Friday's lecture.

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