Daily Life in Migori

The main hall of the hospital

     Every weekday morning we get up, put on our scrubs, eat breakfast, and then walk down the road to St. Joseph’s Mission Hospital. We first go to the morning meeting where the doctors and nurses discuss what happened during the night (deaths, admissions, etc.) and any troubling cases. Then it’s off to rounds. Where we go on rounds depends on which doctors decided to show up that day. Dr. Agullo does maternity and surgery, Dr. Atonga does pediatrics, and Dr. Migowe does the medical wards. Sometimes all the doctors are there, sometimes none of them are. It keeps life interesting. Each ward has it’s own advantage. Peds rounds are the shortest and the kids are cute but Dr. Atonga rarely explains what the case is or what he is doing to treat the patient. Surgery and maternity can be quite exciting if there’s a delivery or surgery, but not too thrilling if there’s not, though the babies are adorable. The medical wards are long, but they provide the greatest variety and number of cases and the Dr. Migowe is a great teacher. He usually outlines a patient's case to us and then starts asking our opinions of what the patient has, what questions to ask to clarify the condition, and what treatments would be best.

Food from the Goat Roast

     After rounds, there are a few more options of things to do. Some people just go straight back to the house. I'm here to get medical experience so I can apply to PA schools though, so I usually stick around until lunch. There’s the pharmacy where you can fill prescriptions and explain the medications to patients while joking around with Emmanuel (a.k.a. Bobby) the pharmacist. There’s the mobile clinic where you drive for an hour to help out at a clinic in some more remote areas. There’s the HIV & TB counseling clinic and a physiotherapy clinic, but I haven’t been to either of them yet. If there’s a surgery you can observe or scrub in. I usually end up in the lab, at least until lunch. There I get to draw blood or run tests (CD4 counts, blood groups, typhoid tests, etc.). I even got to stain a blood smear and determine whether or not the patient had malaria. 

Observing a surgery

     In the afternoon, we head back to the house for lunch. Our cook, Helen, always makes something good. It's fairly easy to guess what we'll be having though. It's almost always rice, a cabbage dish, and some form of meat. My personal favorite would be the fish. After lunch you can go back to the hospital (the lab and pharmacy are sometimes the only options of places to work at that point) or you can stay at the house. 

     The weekends and our free time are usually spent the same way. The internet is quite slow here, and there's only one computer (unless someone brought a laptop), so we don't spend much time with that. Instead we'll most often be found reading, laying in the sun, or watching a movie. There's also a ton of neighborhood kids who hang about all the time whom we sometimes play with. They can get a bit crazy though (especially if they think we have candy), so it can get tiring. They also make quiet outdoor activities a bit difficult. There are quite a few churches around if we want to go on Saturday or Sunday, but the problem is finding one that speaks English. There's at least one though.

Fabric store near Tanzania

     Every couple days or so we have to head into town. How often you go depends mostly on how much water you drink and how much you feel like lugging up the dirt road. There are lots of things in town besides water though. There are stands and shops everywhere with everything from fresh fruit to very cheap movies (hence our tendency to watch a lot of them) to cell phones to clothing. If we feel like leaving Migori, there are a few excursions we can go on. Through the program there’s the chance to go on a safari in Maasai Mara (I’m hopefully going next weekend!) and/or Mombasa, but there are shorter excursions too. If you want fabric, the border of Tanzania (about 13 miles away) is the place to go, but a hilltop in Kisii is the place for souvenirs. There’s also Lake Victoria and Kisumu, but I haven’t gone to either of those places yet. All in all, life here is quite different, but I'm really enjoying it and trying to take advantage of every minute.

     By the way, for people who are interested in becoming a PA, this can be a great program for getting medical experience. Pretty much everything I do is hands on direct patient care. You can get a lot of hours too, but it really depends on how motivated you are. Most of the people in the program just go to the hospital for 3 or 4 hours in the morning (or not at all if they stayed out late at the clubs), so if you want to put in a full days work, or even go in on the weekends as well, you may be at the hospital by yourself. Also, due to the limited internet, filling out applications, lining up experience for when you get home, or communicating with schools is rather difficult, so just be prepared for that and try not to have many things to take care of while you're here.

Swahili Words of the Post:

soma -to read

lala -to sleep