November camps 2007

A joint eye camp with Dr Gloria Patrick-Ferife and her team, preparing the Clinic base for operations, five medical camps, plus a vaccination camp.

Another frustrating example that confirms the need for a permanent Clinic base.

This 13 year old girl had an local infection 2 years ago below her knee. Without any access to simple antibiotics and being educated to seek advice this infection has now eroded into the knee joint , affecting the bone and destroying the joint. You can see the discharging points above and below the knee. This girl will never walk properly again, purely the result of ignorance and simple, early treatment.  There were many such examples on these camps, and continuity of simple care can prevent catastrophes as evidenced in an earlier diary entry.

This month we saw the spectre of HIV more prominantly in the camps and we have started to offer counselling and testing to those who request it. It is an ethical dilemma when the realistic chance of obtaining retrovirals is almost zero, but we were surprised how receiving the diagnosis was for some a relief in providing an answer for a slow debilitation.  All the eye patients are screened for HIV preoperatively.

Vaccination against measles, DPT, tetanus and meningitis were undertaken, covering 600 children in a remote community. Regular visits are planned to followup each child , but the physical isolation of some of these people makes the exercise logistically difficult. Despite this ad hoc approach, we have seen, as have the government inspectors,that the incidence of Measles is very low in the communities in which we work.

 Again we appreciate the partnership of Eye Care Health Initiative in these camps, led by Dr Patrick-Ferife.

Most of these patients could not travel to the city and though carrying surgical services into the remoter creeks is difficult , the joy of sight restored is total recompense.

The clinic base was completed and the carpentry finished, electrics installed and the 'plumbing' such as it is fixed. Security grills are in situ and the rain tanks are full holding over 6000 litres of clean water. From next year all surgical work will be undertaken at the clinic, the first camp being April.

After a community survey that is currently underway to ascertain baseline statistics for the community the  clinic will open full-time in the next four weeks.