Thursday 13th October 2016
Frankie, Antoinette and Hilary had a very productive and enjoyable two hour meeting this morning with Professor Jasper, the head of Lira University. We are hopeful that the MOU between our organisations will be signed next week after a couple of amendments.
Hilary then spent a few hours with Gudrun the VSO midwife on labour ward. They make a good team and the family of a baby she was involved with wanted to name the baby after her! She spent some more time trying to tidy and organise the chaotic labour ward and we are planning to have cloths made so that there will we proper delivery packs wrapped and sterilised along with something to wrap the new born baby in. Cost estimated at only £25 for 30 reusable packs! She’s currently helping Gudrun with her NMC revalidation process. She’s given out lots of nurses watches during her time here…they are the most useful bargaining and reward tool ever!
The team packed in the teaching hours today – Lesley had a full day at the university teaching antenatal monitoring and obstetric emergencies but also had involved discussions with the students about respect for the mothers. It transpires that Uganda has signed up to the white ribbon alliance which promotes the woman’s right to a safe birth (whiteribbonalliance.org/).
Peter taught in NICU and duly set off to collect Sandy and Liv’s papier mache stools, only to find them newly coated in their 17th layer… with a few more layers still to go, and joined Lesley at the university in the afternoon. Judy managed to stick more suture kits to every wall and table to teach suturing, and had a good session with students on pelvic anatomy in theatres and bowel obstruction on the wards.
There was a good turnout for the Basics course in the afternoon for Diabetic emergencies from Ant and Frankie, followed by a session with the new interns on resuscitation.
After the alternative team resuscitation at the hotel bar, Chris (the VSO neonatal nurse consultant) and Gudrun joined us for dinner out in town, acknowledging the last day for Peter, Antoinette and Hilary….. Poor Hilary and Lesley had to wait ages for their pizza – so just shared every one else’s instead. We will miss them…..
