First day at the Hospital

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So today was my first day at the hospital. I turned up at 8am, and finished at 9:30am. Most other days will take an hour or so longer, but I'll be done by lunch time every day. Which means I have plenty of time to do touristy things and see St Lucia.



So the hospital was really run down. There was no air con, just some ceiling fans that apparently break down regularly. The ward had no sinks, just one hand sanitiser dispenser that the doctors never used. The beds had no curtains around them, no side rooms, so all the patients are just together and there's no privacy. They don't have computers on the ward, so all xrays are sent to a whatsapp group and the doctors can just look up their patients on their phone to see the xray. It was all quite different from the UK and NHS. It has 160 beds total, and despite being the main trauma unit for the island, the A&E department has only 6 beds and only one resuscitation room. So it's small. The next biggest and closest hospital burned down 9 years ago and has been running from the old Olympic Stadium ever since. The stadium has still been in use for sporting events during this time as well, even hosting the youth commonwealth games. They did try to build a new hospital, but the governments changed over before it was finished and the new government has run out of money and doesn't want to complete the building. So they're abandoning that and just using the stadium.



Only one consultant was there today, which is why it was over so quick. The ward is small anyway, and this consultant is in charge of half of it, so we saw 4 patients today. There was a boy with sickle cell, a baby with croup and pneumonia, a girl with low platelets and unfortunately a toddler with a spiral fracture to her femur. If you know what a spiral fracture is, it's pretty sad news. Sickle cell is super rare in the UK, but very common here, so I learnt a lot about that today and will probably see it a bit more while I'm here. It was also interesting that they used slightly different blood tests to the normal in the UK, because they are too expensive here. It was also interesting that the most common infections and pathogens were pretty much the same as the UK, despite the climate and lifestyle differences.



So it was a quick ward round, with only a few patients, but I learnt a fair bit to say it was just over an hour. Hopefully tomorrow I can spend a bit longer and do a bit more.

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Photos

St Jude
The new hospital that has been abandoned and unfinished

Olympic Stadium
The stadium being used as a hospital

Victoria Hospital
Victoria hospital, where I will be for the next 2 months