Blog post #1

Blog Post #1

Zambia GH

James Hickling

6/18/17

One experience I have had that has particularly stood out to me in Zambia so far is shadowing in the malnutrition ward of the pediatrics wing at University of Zambia school of medicine teaching hospital. My shadowing partner and I, Tiffany, arrived at the wing around 9 a.m., and were introduced by the head of teaching, Dr. Songwe, to the Doctor in charge of the wing, Dr. Chandwe. Upon entering the wing, I was immediately struck by how open it was, with fifty or more beds with sick children all in the same large room. Dr. Songwe had explained that this building had used to be the kitchen for the hospital, but had since been renovated and converted into the malnutrition ward. Dr. Chandwe was immediately very accommodating to us, explaining what he was doing with each patient, describing the disease and the factors, biological and sociological, that lead to a child ending up with the condition. I was deeply struck by how sad it was to see malnourished babies so young, with their bones showing and their stomachs swelling from edema. Babies with sickle cell anemia, cystic fibrosis, meningitis, Hepatitis, and HIV. One child, his limbs frozen in an outward position and the front of his skull shrunken because of cystic fibrosis, was particularly heart broken. He had been born with HIV, his own mother not knowing her HIV status until she brought her child into the hospital and he was tested leading to her own testing. This child had been brought into the world without much of a chance at all, born into poverty with the crippling immune disease, exposed to infection and meningitis that had hindered brain development and lead to his cystic fibrosis. His mother sat by his bedside, stone-faced and helpless.

This experience made me realize the sad state of Zambian public health, that even the most advanced hospital in the country endures what would be considered abhorrent conditions in the U.S. Observing Dr. Chandwe gave me faith that the system has good doctors, working hard to improve the health of the country and having success in doing so. This experience also reaffirmed my interest in shadowing at the hospital, and I am eager to see what other wards of pediatrics are like.