Blantyre Clinic

Today is our last day of clinic in Malawi. We are so sad to be leaving, but extremely proud of the work that we have  accomplished during our visit here. 

We have spent the last 3 days working at 3 different clinical placements and have seen a lot of patients. Our first day we spent at a children's rehabilitation center with Victor, a Canadian trained hearing aid technician who has opened his own facility with an OT/PT therapist. They have worked very hard and have a beautiful new space. We spent a 10 hour day testing adults and children, and fit about 40 hearing aids. It was a great first day! We missed working with the ABC students but were glad to have Victor and Lewis there to help.

The following day, we worked at the Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital with Dr Wakisa Mulwafu, the only ENT in Malawi, and several clinical officers. When we arrived in the morning, we had over 70 patients waiting! We started working immediately, but found that many of the patients were multiply involved and difficult to test. We also saw patients that had very sad stories and poor prognosis. At the end of a long day we were pleased with the number of patients we saw, but had to send so many patients away. You can only move so fast! 

Yesterday we worked at the Mulanje District Hospital about an hour outside of Blantyre. We spent another 10 hours working hard, and saw some amazing pathologies! We saw a patient with possible herpes zoster oticus on the tympanic membrane, one with no tympanic membranes which allowed you to see the round window and Eustachian tube, and several patients with blindness and unilateral deafness. It was a great day for masking and otoscopy! 

Today we will return to QECH to see as many patients as possible. We are all exhausted both physically and emotionally, but will put all we can into our day to serve the people that we can. 

Tomorrow we will spend a day at James' village where Victor is from, in order to present them with an oven and baking materials that we purchased for them, by donations from parents of recent ASU graduates and others in the department. We are so excited to see them again, they are an extremely welcoming community! 

We then travel back to Lilongwe to spend a day of relaxation before flying out on Wednesday. 

See you soon!