A week at the hospital

So in terms of work....this has been a pretty exciting week for me. Unfortunately, it was preceded by some rather frustrating news that will have a pretty significant impact on my time here.....but hey, I’m trying to make lemonade. The unfortunate piece goes something like this....ICAP supports hospitals and clinics all over the country – nearly all of which part of the national health system (i.e. public not private facilities). Apparently the Ministry of Health has refused to authorize me to visit any of these public facilities. Which pretty much restricts me to the office, working on data collection instruments and interventions for clinics that I have never stepped foot in. Right.

But as luck would have it, ICAP also works with two hospitals in Maputo that are not part of the public health system. Instead, these are facilities that belong to the Department of Defense – the military hospital and the police hospital (important note – as far as I can tell military personnel are in fact treated at the military hospital but you do not have to be military to be a patient there, and many of the patients we deal with are not military). And these facilities are much more open to the idea of a public health student from Columbia coming to their facilities to observe how things work.

So what’s all the excitement?? I’ve spent every morning this week at the Military hospital checking things out....which a) gets me out of the office for half the day and b) allows me to see how the whole system functions on the ground. A bit of context....the military hospital has an entire area that is dedicated to HIV/AIDS called the Day Hospital (it’s kind of like it’s own little clinic within the hospital). The day hospital is responsible for the care and treatment of all HIV+ patients, and consists of two small buildings. One houses the reception, the pharmacy, six rooms for medical consultations and counseling, and a hallway that houses the day hospital’s two computers and two data entry people. The other building I haven’t actually been in, but I understand that’s where the nurses are. There is an outdoor corridor/veranda type thing that connects the two buildings, and this serves as the waiting room.

Not surprisingly, a lot of very interesting stories are coming out of my week at the military hospital. For starters, I seem to have made quite the impression on the director of the hospital. I have no idea how – my colleague Ana simply introduced me to him and we chatted for a couple of minutes, nothing special. But when we got back to the office the first question out of one of my other colleague’s mouth was, “So, was Dr. Rammadan nice to you?”. And only after Ana and I said that yes, he had been really nice, did my colleagues tell me that he isn’t usually that nice of a guy and that he must have really liked me. The blonde factor strikes again?

Other stories to follow...