Day 4 - Day 8 of Work Experience

Emma's Report Continued

Day 4
Thursday, March 29th
Today, was a fun day shift. I was shadowing Stephanie Hartsell and we had just three patients to look after - an easier day! We had two little baby girls, one of them being my adopt-a-patient, and also a young boy called Washington. My adopt-a-patient was called Musu, and she is 11 months old (she is my patient in the pictures above). She absolutely hated white people to begin with, but I think she is getting to know me a bit better now so that’s good. (She loves being tickled!) Musu was waiting for surgery, just staying on the ward, so we didn’t have to do much with her, just give her a multi-vitamin tablet. The other little girl I had was a 1 year old girl who was in ICU; she wasn’t breathing great on her own after she had surgery. She cried a bit to begin with but after she had some sleep she was a bit better. We had to clean her wound and just in general look after her by taking her temperature and give her her medications. The little boy, Washington, was pretty good, he’s very hyper! All we had to do to him was give him his multi-vitamin tablet, and clean his wound, and he was good.I learnt how to calculate how much medicine to give someone of the right age; it was cool, but hard to explain. I also saw the little girl I had seen in admissions yesterday; she had just had surgery and looked so cute whilst she was sleeping. I enjoyed today, I got to know Stephanie well.
Day 5

Friday, March 30th
Today I was on another day shift (I think Day shifts are my favorite). Iwas shadowing Andrea Ashbacher, she is really nice. My adopt-a-patient, Musu, was one of our patients. We also had a woman named Bendu, a man named Alfred and Little Halinatu, the girl I had yesterday (She had been moved out of ICU). Musu was first on the list for surgery, and her mother found it hard, whilst she was in the OR, but later once Musu came out, she had a huge smile on her face, as did I.
At break time Bev (Ward Manager) said she wanted to chat with Kim Anna and me, about the week so far. So we sat down and talked about what we liked about it so far, if we had seen anything that had disturbed us, if we were upset with anything or anyone, and about what we would like to happen in the next 3 day we would work next week. We talked for about half an hour and decided we wanted to learn CPR on a dummy, so Bev told us we would do that next week. So I am really looking forward to that as I suggested it. This was a really good day and I enjoyed it.
Day 6

Monday, 2nd April

Today I was working an evening shift and I made a very good friend. Her name is Mummy; she is 18 and is the auntie of one of the patients here. She is so sweet, I was showing her all my funny faces and we played clapping games and she also made me a really nice bracelet. I would shout to her “MUMMY!” and she would reply “EMMA, YES!” We had lots of fun.I was shadowing Sophie Smith today, she is really nice and from New Zealand. Today I fed someone through the gastric tubes. My patient Musu is a lot better today, she even smiles at me now, and will hold my finger.
After Dinner, My Mum and Chris and Josh came down to play with my brother’s adopt-a-patient, also called Chris. He is having surgery on his hand, arm and eye. He has terrible burns and the surgeons hope to free up areas that are so badly burned they restrict his moement. I was able to show my mum my adopt-a-patient, and my friend Mummy, and Kim Anna’s adopt-a-patient also. It was nice.Later, I just played around with some people and had some fun, talked to some of the nurses (As the evening shift isn’t a busy shift)I enjoyed today, I made a great friend, and I love making friends!

Day 7

Tuesday, 3rd April

Today, I was working a day shift again. I was shadowing Hettie, she is really sweet. A big group of patients left today, so there wasn’t a lot to do.But one thing did happen that made me smile, Musu, my adopt-a-patient, let me hold her! I even walked around the ward with her for about 10 minutes, and tickled her, it was great! I took a few pictures also, which I am going to give a few copies to her and her mother.
When shift was over, and it was time for handover, Bev asked us to name a song to sing so we did & after we did, we heard from the other room the translators singing the same song but African style, then they came in to where we were, and we sang it again properly. After that, we asked them to sing us another, then everyone stood up and started dancing, and joined and big line and danced down the ward, clapping and singing. Even the patients who were fit enough joined in. It was such a laugh and everyone had lots of fun.That was the end of shift and it was great!

Day 8 (Final Day)

Wednesday, 4th April

Today was AMAZING! Kim Anna and I found out last night from Bevthat we are able to go down and watch a surgery! So this morning I got up and made sure I had a nice big breakfast, because I didn’t want to get really faint during the surgery and miss a lot of it. When it was time to go up for surgery, we were told that the patient had already been put to sleep. We made our way up to the OR (operating room)and walked through the big double doors to the OR. Kylie Bentham, the OR supervisor told us our guidelines and gave us something to put over our feet, hair and mouth & nose. Then we went with Kylie into one of the operating rooms. We were watching a surgery on a cleft-lip baby. She was 2 years old and her name was Yah. Dr. Tertius was the Surgeon. He started by drawing a line on one side of the lip, then drawing an identical line on then other side (He did this by using a compass.) Then he started cutting her lip in different place as well as where the lines were drawn. It was amazing, and the good thing was that I did not feel faint at all! About half way into the surgery, before he started stitching her up, Dr. Gary Parker (Chief Medical Officer & Surgeon on the ship for 23 years)came into the room with a book about cleft-lip surgeries and he helped explain the procedure. Later on Dr. Tertius started stitching up Yah, and it was amazing how she already looked so good. Then he put on some big strips of tape. The anesthesia provider then took Yah to the recovery room, until she awoke. When she did, they called her mother to come up and it was so nice to see her mother’s reaction.After surgery, the rest of the day wasn’t very busy at all. Musu’s strips of tape came off and she looked absolutely amazing.Something sad also happened today and that was that Mummy and her niece Satta went home.When shift was over Bev told us that we should come back at 3:00 to learn CPR like we had asked. Learning this was so much fun as we had a dummy to practice on.This was my last day of work experience and I enjoyed it a lot. It was a great way to finish.
By Emma Cole