News from Kenya - #18

Journal entry 18

Tuesday May 4, 2010-11:30AM Days 36, 37

Sunday was a quiet day. We were unable to travel to Seme Village to see the new Posho Mill and revisit the well due to washed out roads from the rain. I doubt if we will be able to reschedule that before I leave. Rom and Paul came to the flat and we discussed the student program in some detail.

Rom was still not feeling well and he took a nap. Paul and I watched more of the BBC Planet Earth Series that I brought with me. The video is magnificent. I’m very happy to have my computer working again so we can view more of it before going home. I also read Obama’s book. Paul left about 4 PM and Rom got up but it started rainy very heavily again so he went back to bed. He is dizzy and sweaty. He managed to go home about 8PM. I have a supply of peanut butter and jelly and cup of soup mixes so I was well fixed for meals. I watched the news and went to bed.

Monday Cecelia came about 10AM and we went shopping at Nakumatt for water and supplies. Felix came with the letter from his brother Reagan for his sponsor and we talked a little while. Then Cecelia Felix and I took a Tuk Tuk to see the house and village where Felix and his brothers live in Nylenda It is a large slum village. I’m told the security is poor and it is not safe. Cecelia was thinking of trying to find a shop and/or a house there but it does not seem like a good place for her and the children, even if we could find a house etc. The area was very muddy from the rain.

Felix and his brothers live in his deceased mom’s home. It is a three-room house with electricity in the living room. The floor is mud and the roof is made of iron sheets. Felix’s stepsister was doing the wash and hanging it up outside to dry on lines between trees. There were many wide-eyed children saying, “How are you” to me. I know to answer “I’m fine, how are you?” as that is the phrase they are taught.

It is about 15 minutes in a Tuk Tuk from Town to Nylenda and Felix has to travel it twice/day and sometimes more often. He often walks or has to pay for a matatu. He is the student I sponsor so I decided to help get him a bicycle at the same place I got the other two. I told our driver the name of the store but could not tell him where it was. Our Tuk Tuk driver, Maurice said he knew the store, but he didn’t, so we rode all around town. I wish I had a better sense of direction. I had walked to the store with Paul on Saturday but we had walked to so many stores and we were winding around so I did not remember where it was. We called Paul and he misunderstood my question because of all the noise. He gave the man directions back to the flat! Ugh. I called Paul again when it was quiet and he was able to tell Maurice where the shop was. I got Felix the same style bike as the other two boys and he was very grateful.

Cecelia and I came back to the flat. She wanted to do my wash for me so I went over to Nakumatt to get more laundry soap. The phone rang while we were hanging up the wash. It was Connie. Rom was at the MD’s and still very sick. He went to school but left after a couple of hours, as he was dizzy, with a severe headache. Cecelia and I walked over to the MD office to join them. The office was very busy and the MD had been called to the local hospital on an emergency so we waited a long time. They tested for malaria and typhoid and his blood sugar. He does not have malaria or typhoid but his blood sugar was very high and his white blood count was also high indicating a bacterial infection of some kind. They gave him a broad-spectrum antibiotic and told him to come back in 5 days when they are finished. I am worried about him. Mamma is doing OK.

Cecelia and I walked back to the flat and Paul met us after finishing his driving lesson. He is taking his driver’s test on May 13^th. I’m sure he will do fine. Cecelia went back to Rom and Connie’s house and Paul and I went to RK Hotel for dinner about 8 PM.

We came back to the flat and talked a while and he headed home about 9 PM. He said the night before he went home in the heavy rain and some of the water near his house was up to his THIGHS!

Tuesday 4.30PM

After writing the above, I was just about to call Maurice to bring his Tuk Tuk to take Cecelia and me to Kanyamedha Secondary School to meet Paul and then go and see his house, when Connie called me on the phone. Rom was even sicker than yesterday with vomiting and diarrhea and a high fever. They were about to go to Russia hospital by Tuk Tuk. I cancelled my plans to meet Paul, and Cecelia and I went to meet Connie and Rom at the hospital. As I’ve mentioned before sometimes care is quicker if there is a mwzungu (white person) around.

When I got there Rom was still in the ER-he was lying on a plinth with an IV of saline solution going into his left wrist. Connie said they almost carried him from the Tuk Tuk into the ER. His blood sugar was very high. They use a different system here and normal is 5 to 7. His was 32. His temperature was 101.3 F. He is also jaundiced with yellowing around his eyes and his hands and feet were obviously yellowish. He was alert but poorly responsive. Connie’s sister Clementine is a nursing supervisor of all the hospitals in Nyanza Province including Russia, and she arrived shortly after I did. She has some “clout”- more than a mwzungu- at least with all the nurses. The MD came in shortly and said Rom would be admitted and they would give him IV antibiotic, and insulin to bring his sugar down. They also planned to do further blood tests and a complete work up of the status of his liver. It sounded appropriate.

Then we just waited and nothing happened for over an hour. Rom was practically unconscious and had lost control of his urine. I felt so terrible for him and there was nothing I could do. Finally about 1.5 hours after the MD said he would be admitted they took him up to ward 3. His ward has 25 beds. There are not curtains dividing any of the beds so there is no privacy. He could not be properly cleaned up until the family brought in a basin and soap etc. They also have to bring a dish, silverware and a cup from home and bring in food for him. Almost all the patients were wearing their own clothes, as there are few hospital gowns. One of the nurses brought a clean set of sheets and “hid” them under the cover so Rom would have clean sheets once he was cleaned up. She did that as a special favor. At least the bed was much more comfortable than the plinth. They gave him a pillow and Connie covered it with a cloth she had brought from home. Charles, his nephew, brought up a change of clothes for him to wear after he was washed up. The sanitation is terrible. After he was pulled off the cart onto the hospital bed – the cart was soiled with urine. They were going to use it to move another person without cleaning it off. There are no coverings on the carts or plinths. Clementine told them to clean it off so they took a dry cloth and wiped it.

Rom’s sheet was soaked with urine but he was covered with another sheet so it was not obvious. The MD came in to evaluate him and leaned his ungloved hand on the sheet until the urine came through. He then just wiped it on his lab jacket and went on to the next person. I was appalled.

Finally after about another 45 minutes, and after Clementine made a special request, they put some insulin into his IV.

It is amazing to me anyone ever gets well. I had waterless soap in my bag so I shared it with Clementine and Cecelia before we left the hospital. Connie stayed with Rom. Cecelia, Clementine and I took a matatu back to the flat. Clementine had to go back to work. She asked Cecelia to buy a basin for Rom to use at the hospital. We went to Nakumatt and bought a basin, towel, washcloth, antiseptic soap, a plastic dish for his food and a plastic cup. We then headed back to the hospital as visiting hours end at 6 PM and it was almost 5.45.

We made it just in time and went back to the ward to see Rom. The man in the bed close to him had just died and his wife asked to borrow Connie’s phone to call family members. He was still in the bed with the covers pulled up over him. Rom was still in the same condition. That is he had not been cleaned up and was still lying in his urine. Now that they had the basin Connie was going to wash him. She stepped away for a few minutes and some nurses came and said they were going to change his sheets. I said Connie was going to wash him and they should wait to change the sheets until after that. They said he could wait until tomorrow to be washed. I said no. In the meantime Connie had called Clementine to please come back to the hospital. When she arrived about 30 minutes later she arranged to have a catheter inserted. She had to go to a different building of the hospital to get one and in about 45 minutes came back with it. They were also trying to find a way to heat some water, as there is no hot water in the hospital. That never happened. Clementine arranged to have some of “her nurses” insert the catheter, clean up Rom and change his sheets while we waited in the hallway. When we went back in about 30 minutes later he was all cleaned up. They even found a hospital gown for him to wear. I was relieved that at least he was now on clean dry sheets.

Cecelia, Paul and I took a Tuk Tuk “home” and now I am going to relax and pray for Rom.

Please everyone keep Rom in your thoughts and prayers. He is very sick.

End of Journal 18