Broadhurst 3

Today was my first clinical day. I started my internship at the Broadhurst 3 clinic. At first it was a little weird being there but after getting a tour of the clinic and doing a little work the three of us placed there all felt at home. I spent the day in the Reproductive Health part of the clinic where we saw pregnant women, mothers and children, and women who were there for birth control. Right when I walked into the room one of the midwives told me to step behind the current where the patient was. Within 2 minutes of being there I was able to feel a baby's head of a woman who was just shy of 9 months pregnant. I also got to listen to the fetal heart beat...pretty cool start of the day. The rest of the morning I was shown the ropes on how to record information in their logs, what to look for on prenatal charts, and how to measure certain things. I also counted out some ascorbic acid and iron pills for the mothers to take home.

We took lunch at 12:45 which seemed like so long when we started at 7:30am. We had a long lunch break then we assisted the pharmacist with counting pills and distributing allergy medicine. Although the morning was busy, the afternoon was fairly slow, most people were in line to consult with the doctor so there wasn't much we could assist with. But we also talked to the woman who worked with preventing HIV transmission from mother to child. Hopefully tomorrow I will get to work with her and ask her a few more questions.

A few interesting tidbits...a lot of people come into the clinic on Mondays with a hangover saying that they are sick so they can get out of work for the day. Or people come in "sick" on Fridays so they can have a long holiday. Most of the jobs are government jobs and if a doctor says a person needs a month of leave, they get it. The clinic is also run by the government so people only pay a 5 pula consultation fee (less than $1), but the drugs and medical care they receive are free otherwise. So far they system they have seems to be working well and from what I have seen they are making great strides to fight the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Also a random fact...after a mother gives birth the husband does not sleep in bed with her for a few months or may even sleep in a different room. Some husbands aren't even allowed to see their children at birth. I asked the nurse why and she said that's just the culture. When her husband picked her up after her 2nd child was born her mother was very mad. From what I understood the father could bring bad luck or sickness. I'll have to ask my host family about this tonight.

Yesterday was very interesting as well. Although the morning started out a bit boring with 2 lectures, we walked to fresh cafe for lunch. so good! Had a salad wrap and salad. Doesn't sound that amazing but when all you've been eating is meat and starches with some fried food here and there, you crave something fresh! At 3 we visited the SOS orphanage in Tlokweng. The SOS orphanage is a bunch of small houses (around 14 or so) and in each house is 6-8 children with 2 house mothers. Each house is sponsored by a local business so some of the houses were a little nicer than others. But all were well equipped with places to sleep, eat and do homework. After a tour of the village we got to play with the kids! ages 5-14 and they all loved to jump on us and use our cameras. I got to play soccer/futbol with a few boys, I also played piggy back tag and got in a work out. Some of the kids stole my friends cameras and started taking picture, mainly of us, but there are some good ones.

I also got a Setswana name today. Gottfried at the clinic was surprised that i did not have a name yet so he called me Bontle...the setswana name for beauty. My friend got the name Lorato, which means love...although later we also found out that it was a condom brand that was all over the clinic. My other friend at the clinic got a name from her mom Mpoh...which means gift, she had never had a daughter so she called Rachel her gift. Everyone is so nice here and accepts you into their family! My mum is working on naming me as well. They are from the Hererro tribe so she says I need a Hererro name. I will be leaving Botswana with 2 more names then I came with!

Boitumelo! (Happiness)