Wifi is a Luxury

Welcome to Ghana where power, running water, and wifi are optional as well as a luxury. I have not had wifi thus no updates in almost 10 days. So, where to begin...

We had our first clinic at a hospital in Kumasi called Aninwah Medical Center. Seeing this hospital for the first time was very difficult. It definitely is not what I am accustomed to in America and I have the hardest time understanding how they are able to manage without everything we have in America. Due to the fact that the people in Ghana do not have the means to quality health care the average death age here in Ghana is 65 years for both male and female.

This is the entrance gate to Aninwah.

When we go to the hospitals they welcome us with open arms and it is so strange because we can go anywhere we want within the hospital whenever we want. We can walk right into the maternity ward where the babies are and there is no security. We can go watch a surgery in the theater (Operating room and yes every OR here is called the theater) if we want and they are more than happy to have us. People wander in and out of the hospital all day and no one really questions. They gave us a tour at Aninwah and we were able to see just about everywhere. We saw the lab, the ER (it is comparable to an instacare back home), maternity, labor and deliver, female ward, male ward, pharmacy, the theater, and that basically sums up the hospital. They have no private rooms everyone just gets put into one big room with multiple beds. There might have been one or two private rooms here, but they cost a lot of money. The overall feeling of the hospital is old, run down, and dirty. It is very difficult to come from America where everything is so clean and everyone is obsessed with germs to a country where cleaning your hands is optional as well as wearing shoes. People just aren't as worried over here, which could be a good or a bad thing, I'm not sure yet.

This is the pharmacy in the hospital.

 

This is the labor and delivery suite.

Sweet little babes :)

As I said above, we can get in anywhere and they will basically let us do almost anything as long as we ask of course. This was a baby from another set of twins.

After getting a tour of the hospital we started our clinic. At our clinics we provide some education, perform a basic assessment, and then give out toothbrushes, toothpaste, and condoms. I help teach hand hygiene as well as perform assessments. Teaching can be a struggle because even though English is the primary language of Ghana most people do not speak it very well, they all speak different dialects. We have to use interpreters, which for the most part they have been amazing. With this clinic being our first we, as a group, did not know what to expect. We tried to have organization, but that went right out the window once word got out about what was going on. Word spreads fast here and kids multiply even faster. We will start out with about five kids and within a matter of minutes we have quadrupled in size.

 

Getting ready to teach.

The kids are absolutely adorable here. I have fallen in love. Even though they can be quite the handful, it is hard to ever be mad at them. They are so happy and always so excited to see us. They love to have their picture taken and then immediately want to see what it looks like. We will take the picture and then the quickly come to your side to see what the picture looked like. They love seeing themselves in pictures. They also love taking your camera and taking their own pictures, once they do this it is very hard to get your camera back.

 

This is our driver's, Richard, daughter. Her name is Sandee.

Showing off their toothbrushes.

 

Sorry, for only one picture. The internet is too slow here to upload anything. Hopefully once I get to Accra on Friday I can add more pictures.