The week of "lasts"

     Last day to go to Foret des Pins on moto, last Sunday in church here etc... The good news is- we do have nurses coming. About a week after I go home Rosalie Nichols from Kansas  is coming here to work for 4-6 weeks. After that Kay Wedel from Mississippi is coming for several months and we are hoping after that Charlotte Nightengale will come for an indefinite amount of time. Then Kyle Isaac (he is an EMT) is coming to visit for a couple of weeks also and will possibly come for longer at a later date. Don't worry though, if you didn't get your name in quite soon enough this time we are sure there will be more chances.
      Last week it rained a little bit several different days adding up to a little over two inches altogether and now yesterday and today it has rained off and on giving us another inch and a half. We are very happy for the rain. Now people are starting to prepare their gardens for the next crop.
    Yesterday morning I woke up to a message on my phone about a lady who was at the clinic to have a baby. We had seen someone Friday evening also but she wasn't quite ready so we sent her back home. This lady had three children already so we didn't think it should be too bad of a delivery- at least she should know what is happening. Once again I think these ladies have a sixth sense when something isn't right. This lady had a very bad infection already. I started an IV and some oxytocin but things weren't progressing rapidly at all so April and I ate some granola we had brought along and then worked on stocking some medicines. After an hour or two the lady decided now was the time to have that baby. She didn't have a very hard time but the baby didn't look good at all when it was born.  She had the cord around her neck and there was a lot of nasty fluid in her mouth and nose. I suctioned her right away and got a lot of stuff out of her airway but she still didn't look good and wasn't breathing so we got the cord cut then took the baby and worked on her for a while but she never took a breath. Finally I listened with a stethoscope to see if she had a heartbeat but she didn't. Her tongue and mouth were all coated with a green/brown film that stayed even after she was suctioned so I think she must have gotten some of that fluid in her lungs too. The mom did well. Hopefully she will be able to recover from the infection. There were no tears when we told the family that the baby didn't live. It's just a totally different culture here.
   We don't know what happened with the "triplets". They haven't been back for over a month now. There are definitely a lot of other needy babies that will get formula from the money everyone sent. It is very much appreciated.
    A lady came to the clinic Wednesday who was eight months pregnant with her third child. She had been living down in Port for several months. She was very anemic. Her oxygen level was 55%. The family said she had only been "giving" blood since the day before. Apparently she had spit up some blood and had several episodes of a bloody nose. We didn't even give her IVF's but sent her down to the hospital as soon as we could. She needed blood, BAD... We hadn't checked the fetal heart rate because it wouldn't have changed our plan of care- she needed a hospital. At the hospital they determined that her baby was no longer alive and she needed emergency surgery. They took her into surgery but she didn't make it. I just wish she had come sooner, maybe we could have done more to help her if she had. Later we found out that her family in Port had sent her up to the rest of the family here in the mountains to either see a witch doctor or die. To me that says she must have been sick for a while already. Her funeral was on Friday. We didn't have a lot of patients on Friday at the clinic so we finished just in time to go to the funeral. It was a pretty calm event. Only one person had to be hauled  out of the church because they were making too much of a disturbance.