Sunday saw us flying out to Kupang with our partners and Dinnia - very convenient as yet again my luggage was over weight; I will leave most of it on the island. We had to stay over night in Kupang as the feryy leaves at 08:00 in the morning. We managed to catch up with Sam whilst we were there.On Monday we caught the new fast ferry to Rote – only 2 hours once it gets going; we were only 40 minutes late leaving. We are seeing the island at its’ brownest as the rains are due 
to start any day now yet it was still beautiful. It is hillier than I had anticipated so with the intense heat I may have to rethink my plan to get a bicycle. We dined in a restuarant with the magnificent view before being taken to the hospital to meet our collegues and to have the grand tour.
I am finding it hard to find the right words to describe the hospital. It is relatively new and has lots of building work going on. The A&E is being extended, an ITU is being built and a rehabilitation ward refurbished. There are beds for 48 in patients and an out patient facility with 4 examination roo
ms. They have an X-ray facility, laboratory, pharmacy and kitchen. There are also 2 ambulances. There are 50 nurses/midwives, 6 doctors - but no specialists and a dentist along with lots of support staff.
There is limited running water in the wards, many of the beds do not have mattresses and what there are leave a lot to be desired as they have no plastic covers, the range of equipment is very, very limited. They do have a few packs of sterile gloves and once these have been used they are then washed and reused when the nurse or doctor needs to protect themselves. A&E is not very busy – Friday saw the most patients – 15. The inpatient wards were more like crèches with more of the nurses' children in them than patients - due to lack of child care provision. The most inpatients last week was 7 and one day there were none. The malaria and dengue season will start with the rains so this may see a change in level of patients. All inpatients seem to get a drip – what ever their condition and caring for this and doing observations appears to be the only direct contact nurses have with patients. They do however keep amazingly detailed records. I accompanied Ellen on the daily ‘matrons’ round – we spoke to the staff read the patient records then went to see the patients – I was expected to ask relevant questions to the pat
ients. Ellen would then want to know how we cared for similar patient in the UK. I am trying emphasise the similarities as I know they are not going to be able to offer half the interventions we do.
We stayed down the hill in a hotel in central Baa - the main town on the island. As you can see the main shopping street is not very busy but despite this has a one-way system.
During the week the doctors took us to a couple of beaches on the island to get a flavour for the real beauty it has to offer. Ths included a visit to Nembrala the West coast tourist 'resort' on the island. The area attracts dedicated surfers during the dry season but the main hotel was closing up that week prior to the rains. The manager invited us to used the sea water swimm
ing pool and we saw the most amazing sun set. The picture at the start of my blog was taken here.
We also started to experince what life on Rote was going to be like - power cut are a regular part of life. We were lucky the hotel had a generator so we could sit outside to read by the light of a single bulb.
to start any day now yet it was still beautiful. It is hillier than I had anticipated so with the intense heat I may have to rethink my plan to get a bicycle. We dined in a restuarant with the magnificent view before being taken to the hospital to meet our collegues and to have the grand tour.I am finding it hard to find the right words to describe the hospital. It is relatively new and has lots of building work going on. The A&E is being extended, an ITU is being built and a rehabilitation ward refurbished. There are beds for 48 in patients and an out patient facility with 4 examination roo
ms. They have an X-ray facility, laboratory, pharmacy and kitchen. There are also 2 ambulances. There are 50 nurses/midwives, 6 doctors - but no specialists and a dentist along with lots of support staff.There is limited running water in the wards, many of the beds do not have mattresses and what there are leave a lot to be desired as they have no plastic covers, the range of equipment is very, very limited. They do have a few packs of sterile gloves and once these have been used they are then washed and reused when the nurse or doctor needs to protect themselves. A&E is not very busy – Friday saw the most patients – 15. The inpatient wards were more like crèches with more of the nurses' children in them than patients - due to lack of child care provision. The most inpatients last week was 7 and one day there were none. The malaria and dengue season will start with the rains so this may see a change in level of patients. All inpatients seem to get a drip – what ever their condition and caring for this and doing observations appears to be the only direct contact nurses have with patients. They do however keep amazingly detailed records. I accompanied Ellen on the daily ‘matrons’ round – we spoke to the staff read the patient records then went to see the patients – I was expected to ask relevant questions to the pat
ients. Ellen would then want to know how we cared for similar patient in the UK. I am trying emphasise the similarities as I know they are not going to be able to offer half the interventions we do.We stayed down the hill in a hotel in central Baa - the main town on the island. As you can see the main shopping street is not very busy but despite this has a one-way system.
During the week the doctors took us to a couple of beaches on the island to get a flavour for the real beauty it has to offer. Ths included a visit to Nembrala the West coast tourist 'resort' on the island. The area attracts dedicated surfers during the dry season but the main hotel was closing up that week prior to the rains. The manager invited us to used the sea water swimm
ing pool and we saw the most amazing sun set. The picture at the start of my blog was taken here.We also started to experince what life on Rote was going to be like - power cut are a regular part of life. We were lucky the hotel had a generator so we could sit outside to read by the light of a single bulb.
John and I have been offered a 2 bed roomed house in the hospital compound. I have also been offered the opportunity to share a house with two of the female junior doctors. I think I will probably choose the second option as it will give us a spare room for visitors, give us separate identities and make seeing each other a treat rather than an irritation. It also means if it does not work out living that closely with Indonesians I can move to the other house whilst we sort out an alternative.
On Saturday we travelled back to Kupang prior to our flight back to Bali on Sunday.
No comments:
Post a Comment