Self-guided tour around Coast Province General Hospital

I went into hospital for 9am this morning, getting a lift from our regular taxi driver. The traffic in the morning is really hectic heading towards the island of Mombassa so I'm really glad ElectiveAfrica has organised our journey to and from hospital. I met the other medical students on the general medicine ward round, then decided to explore the hospital a bit on my own. First I went to ophthalmology and after a chat with the nurse there i was introduced to some of the conditions the patients there suffer from, a lot of cataracts, diabetic and hypertensive retinopathy. I continued on my tour and cane across the dialysis unit. It was quite small but very clean and well equipped. I took a history from a regular patient who requires dialysis because of hypertension-associated chronic renal failure. The effect of his illness interfered a lot with his work but he seemed used to getting dialysis and was happy to take me through his story.
Next I decided to call into paediatrics, which was the most enjoyable part of my day. I introduced myself to one father and asked if the little girl on the bed he was sitting on was his daughter. There were two children on the bed, one was his son and the other was the daughter of another woman who had momentarily left the bed. On one bed a examined a child with meningitis, on the next bed a child with sickle cell anaemia (a congenital blood disorder) and on the next bed a child with rheumatic heart disease. I discovered that the child with SSD, also had malaria, had a heamoglobin of 2g/dl (very, very low!) and needed an urgent blood transfusion. The child with meningitis had headache, fever and had experienced convulsions. The child with rheumatic fever had an audible heart murmur. I assisted the doctor on the ward round by helping to take the blood samples for analysis.
Lastly I went to the General Medicine clinic and met a lead consultant. One patient had metabolic syndrome. I have to admit that i didn't expect to see much of this in Kenya because it's mainly a disorder of people in Western nations who lead an unhealthy lifestyle. The doctor explained that people in kenya are eating more unhealthy foods now and suffer more and more form high blood pressure, diabetes and  high cholesterol. The patient in question really liked putting salt on everything she eats! The doctor advised her to change her ways and referred her to various specialists such as the nutritionist.
I got out of hospital at 1pm and cane back to the house for some lunch and internet!