Lab / Hospital / Barnyard Update

Just a quick note as to what’s going on down at the hospital:
E has been going down to the lab to help with a project that we’re a little shorthanded on right now. Well, technically we’re not shorthanded, but it would require a lab tech to put in a full day of work, which is obviously unacceptable. What about chai at 10 am?! 12-2 lunch hour(s)?! These things are sacred, so we’ve brought in the Little One.

The process involves taking blood samples from the kids, and processing them into separate tubes of red blood cells, white blood cells, and plasma. It can be a bit arduous, but with the help of a centrifuge, it only takes a few hours. Anyways, it took about one day of observing, one day of doing while being observed, and now she’s of course found the most efficient way of doing it and finishes more quickly than the tech. It’s awesome of her to help out; it’s nice to have a little company down at the lab, she’s helping the project, and it’s allowing me to go to Nairobi this week for a urology conference (more on that later).

My projects are a little slow right now, but moving forward. The study where I’ll do urine cultures to look for UTIs has been fully approved, but we were waiting on one reagent from the US. Several people just came over and they brought a few boxes of supplies. The reagent was packed, but when the box was opened at the lab, it was not there. We did find a TSA slip saying that they inspected the box, and I wonder if they didn’t put this item back. It’s just too bad because it is literally worthless to 99.99% of the world, but cost $275 and we need it to get started.

I am in Nairobi for the week to attend a urology workshop and conference put on by the Kenyan Association for Urologic Society. The workshop is put on by two pediatric urologists from the US and Switzerland, and will focus on pediatric reconstructive surgery. There are no pediatric urologists in the country, so they’ll be training pediatric surgeons to do certain cases. I’m excited to spend some time in a larger hospital in Kenya (this is the largest teaching hospital in the country). Like most things here, there is still no itinerary, but I just know that I need to be at the hospital at 8:30 AM this morning.

On Friday, E and I made the observation that people are quite a bit closer to nature here than in the US. E shrieked while she was pipetting samples because there was a huge spider inside of the “sterile” hood. While I was away on a 1.5 hour sit-in waiting for the head of the hospital to meet with me (long story), E also dealt with a shrimper who had come by the lab to sell his catch (his price was too high).

As we were about to leave for the day, E ran to another room to grab something, and my favorite goat, one that makes a bleating sound like the girl in The Exorcist, ambled by. Unfortunately, she missed it again. We walked to the truck, and standing directly next to it were a pair of small cows. E approached one as you would a dog, and it proved pet-able. E’s new friend:





E managed to go from separating blood components under a sterile hood to petting a cow in about 30 seconds. This is a strange place. We will update more from the conference and from the lab this week.