The Hospital

It's that time of the week - injecting a little geographic exploration into an otherwise sedentary life.

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It's Wednesday so I thought I would make this entry about travel - and as I'm currently in Haiti, this is the topic. Rather than give you my impressions after having been here only a few days, and also having had a rather confined existence, instead I will take you on a tour of the University Hospital that I visited today. Small patch of earth, but a big tour in other ways.

We went to learn more about their monitoring and evaluation systems - in layman's terms, we were interested in data. Collection, storage, use.

Our visit was focused on HIV and thus, the tour I describe takes place almost entirely in that area of the hospital - with the exceptions noted below.

We began by walking through the waiting area for HIV services. Packed to gills but thankfully chairs and a TV provided by the US! The TV was supposed to have a loop of health education videos but I think someone had changed it to soccer (futbol). Forget about privacy or confidentiality here. You are here for one reason and one reason only - you suspect you have HIV or you know you do.

Next we visited the counseling & testing area. A room full of chairs for those receiving pre-test counseling - a group exercise. A small room for testing, a small room for post-test counseling. You could smell the fresh paint in the Haitian heat.

Next we went to the service areas down the hall - a room for internal medicine, one for pediatrics, one for M&E folks like myself. Some additional rooms for similar activities. They are expanding - doubling the number of rooms to accommodate the increased patient load.

After a tour of the HIV ward we went over to the maternal and child health area - where mothers and children, regardless of HIV status (known or unknown) came in for services. Lots of moms waiting on chairs with sleepy sloth-like infants on their laps. The sweetest faces you'll ever see.

And after that it was the pediatric ward - children in rooms with paint peeling off the walls. Mothers attending to them. A few nurses to adminster medicines. In another room, babies in bassinets, tubes coming out of their tiny little bodies. None above 3lbs. This was the special section for infants whose mothers are HIV-positive. Their status is unknown.

I have to stop writing now. I need a drink.