BEHIND THE SCENES...REAL LIFE ISSUES OF HEALTH

I have been blogging about the major events happening, but there are so many more things that are being managed here in the homes and with the children. These things are the most important...they are the real life issues of Africa and caring for the poor. They have been my focus and have taken up more of my energy, prayers and time, yet I have not talked about it much really.

We have to deal with many things here including, poor water quality in the schools where our children attend, poor quality local doctors, local doctors that do not listen or care as we do about our poor children. The children's health has been good with Douglass's good care, but there are times when the symptoms of the children are hard to track. We have sent one boy in particular to the hospital 3 x for fevers, anemia and weight loss. Each time he has been sent back with either antibiotics or iron tabs. The boy was getting rapidly worse. Douglass finally demanded that he be admitted. The boy's condition deteriorated rapidly at that point and he underwent surgery.

He was found to have a perforated intestine and peritonitis. He did not improve much, so they took him in for surgery again less than a week later. Last week Douglass and I went to visit him in the hospital only to find him gone. He had been taken yet a third time and this time we were not told. Douglass was furious as was I. We did not get answers for a couple days which left all of us, including the in charge brother, very upset and panicked. This boy was weak and frail and the whole community was praying for him.

Visiting Sibabi in the hospital after being called by him on the phone 3 x
"PLEASE Sister Carol, bring me chocolate!"
He was not allowed to eat yet so he just rubbed the bars on his face.  His Mother
chuckling in the background

The scary thing was the fact we have 4-5 other boys with the same early symptoms that this boy had. Sick of not having answers we needed, I sent out emails to everyone I knew including CMMB and Maria Provost, a surgeon now stationed in Mutomo, Kenya. We got a lot of help and resources this way and good referrals to local surgeons. We (Douglass and I) received approval from the in charge brother and took one of the now sick boys to "The Surgery" for testing and assessment. This is the "muzungu" clinic where I go.

The pediatrician, (local Ugandan), was wonderful and listened...we FINALLY had an answer following labs, abdominal ultrasounds, and stool/urine testing. The boys are suffering from a water borne amoeba and salmonella like virus (NOT typhoid as was diagnosed for the boy in the hospital). Medication which only cost 19 USD has cleared it up. Now we are in the process of investigating which water source is contaminated. We are suspecting the school as the boys have been drinking the tap water there, though they know they are not supposed to. They are kids...we will have to come up with another option for them. We will be testing our water just in case though ours is triple filtered.

The remaining boys with the same symptoms are now being sent for testing to see if they need the same treatment. Our boy who underwent surgery is finally improving and will be coming home this week. We are all breathing a sigh or relief now that the mystery has been solved. We THANK GOD and the good doctors at The Surgery as well as the folks at CMMB and Maria Provost for helping us figure out this mystery and keep our children safe and ALIVE!