Additional observations at the hospital

Hello everyone,

I wanted to start this one by thanking all the folk who are reading this. It is a really big help to me whilst I'm out here, far far away, to know that people back home are following what I'm up to and thinking it's pretty neat (from the tone of your comments). So thanks!

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This here post is a collection of items from the hospital that have either caught my interest or amused me over the last week, as I start to get more familiar with the place and spot new things. Hope you enjoy. 

First up, some things that reminded me of home and the hospitals there. 

These blood bottles are the same ones we med students practice taking blood out of fake arms with (and the occasional real person). It was fun to see them 8000 miles from home and comforting to know they use the same system here.

And they've got these! Everyone in healthcare's trusted friend - the blood pressure monitor and oxygen sats probe.

This here is the paperwork stock cupboard. This is the full range of forms that the hospital has. It's a dream to see that it fits into just one bookshelf! There are reams and reams of forms flying around the NHS, haha. And this is what a few of them look like too: they have all the necessary info, but in a nice succinct format. 

(This one's pretty similar to ones back home)

Around the hospital, they've got a number of the local school students' efforts towards health promotion. Diabetes is a big problem here due to a low-physical-activity lifestyle, the introduction of American imported food (which is all sodas and sugary stuff), a lack of vegetables on the island and a lot of sugary fruit available like bananas and bandanus (see my Week 1 post). 

In fact, it's fair to say that the concept of avoiding 'double carbs' is pretty much non existent here on Kosrae. It's more like 'yes to quadruple carbs'. Haha. People eat a lot of rice, bread, breadfruit (a bit like potato) and noodles here. Often all in the same meal. The island equivalent of super noodles is a common breakfast constituent!! Plus a side of bread! And then there is a local food called taro which is sort of like potato again and can also be made into bread (!) And people really do love their soda. Cola every day is a regular occurrence. And then the lifestyle is pretty sedentary. Most people either don't work or sit down for their work. There's lots of sitting at home all day and watching tv. And with no real exercise available on the island (I think the nearest gym must be at least two time zones away), people don't get a regular cardiovascular work out.

So the folks like carbs. And don't do much exercise. So most of them get type 2 diabetes. And are overweight. It's a big problem. (No pun intended)

But fortunately the healthcare bodies are well aware of the problem and are trying (questionably how hard I'm told) but are trying none the less to tackle the problem. And here at Kosrae hospital, they got some of the school kids to make posters about preventing diabetes...

This one was my favourite...

I thought some of you might be interested in the following statistics that are up for public reading in the reception area of the hospital. It covers the number of admissions into hospital and what sort of problems are most prevalent for the month and year thus far. It also might help give you an idea of the size of the hospital. For example, around 60 people visit the hospital each day for some reason or another. Top 3 reasons for visiting as an outpatient are URTIs (things like sore throats, ear infections), diabetes and hypertension but diabetes tops the board for most common reason people are admitted. Similarly to the UK, the most common groups of people presenting to the hospital/gp are children and the elderly. And amazingly, the occupancy rate for their ward is about 50%!!

Here's a sneaky look at the inside of the one and only ambulance at the hospital. 

Now, mental health has a place on the island and within the work of the hospital but alas the hospital has no specialist trained psychiatrist. It does however have some very capable general practitioners and internal medicine doctors and the following handy poster from the WHO, specifically designed for hospitals with limited resources/staff.

I was quite in awe of how they had managed to get pretty much most of the field of psychiatric diagnosis onto a single poster! I slightly wish I had access to this poster during exam time - it would have made revision for psychiatry a whole lot simpler! 

The doctors use this poster to diagnose the patients with suspected mental health problems and the poster signposts to 'modules' which then explain the appropriate treatment. 

I liked this poster very much. 

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On to the amusing stuff, 

Following on from the knowledge you now have about sedentary lifestyles here, you too may also find this poster, stuck up next to the pharmacy counter, a cause for laughter...

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Every hospital, office and company's got one. And Kosrae State Hospital is no different. For all your 'try turning it off and on again' needs, yep, you guessed it, it's the IT department! 

It made me laugh when I had to go here on my second day for induction to logging onto the system. I guess some things you'll never be able to get away from! Haha.

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A nice bit of wall decoration I found while sitting in a clinic this week was this, a collection of principles highly applicable for all healthcare staff I thought. 

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And here's a collection of other posters from around the place that have made me do a double take (or a little giggle) through the week...

(Leprosy is a significant problem here. But it's not quite the stereotype of people with their legs, fingers or toes falling off) 

(As I'm discovering, alternative medicine from local village people or 'quack' doctors they're apparently called has a strong presence in some people's lives. Hence this page in a book about leprosy I found)

Now, I'm not quite too sure what it is about this that made me giggle. Family planning is an important issue here. But it still made me giggle. Hehe.

The hospital's own intranet! See, it's pretty modern in some respects.

However, not so much in the anaesthetics equipment..

And this is what the modern ones look like:

Thats all for now folks. 

If there's any specific questions you have about the island or hospital, or anything, feel free to request a theme for a blog post. It 'll be fun do look into something I haven't thought of yet.