Some Pics "Scene around Chichi" and words from Dr. Chris...

Day 4-5: "Never saying "quiet" applies to Guatemala too!"

by Christina Schwering on Wednesday, November 9, 2011 at 7:30am

Good morning! So the old superstition we develop in residency where you NEVER should say the word "quiet" without cursing yourself to a crazy patient load apparently applies to Guatemala TOO! I had no longer finished telling Tony how clinic usually slowed down on Tuesday when the nurse walked in with our "6 or 7 patients" which were really 13-14 charts... yikes! Then our anesthesia guy, Dr Palma, walks in and informs us that he has to leave at 2:30... uh oh! Thankfully God is good and as it always does, it all worked out!

Me and Kelley and Heidi started our tough case of the day while Leisa screened patients downstairs in the clinic. I have decided that we must have had an invisible extra scrub tech (yep, thats right, Jesus is our scrub tech ;-)) because despite a non-functioning Bovie (cautery), a patient with pretty impressive leg contractures(makes for tough visualization), and miserable tissue, the surgery actually went really well! We removed the really damaged, ulcerated mucosa, took out the tiny little offending organ (:-)), and re-inverted her poor vagina without a lot of problems! It was tedious, but God was certainly with us, because I was completely prepared for a 4-5 hr case like my last trip and we were out in a little less than 3 hrs! We then got some lunch and me and Kelley started our next case while Heidi saw patients with Leisa. At his point I was pretty certain there were some extra hands fishing me stuff from that scrub table, because when Heidi showed up about an hour later, me and Kelley were almost done with the case! Went beautifully... God is SO good!

So today is a busy OR day... not sure about clinic, but worried we may need to turn away people if it is like yesterday. We will probably start a little later as Dr Hoak has an eye mass removal at 8, but after that we have a vaginal hysterectomy for bleeding, 2 abdominal hysterectomies for big goomba uteri (aka lots of fibroids ;-)), and an open ovarian cystectomy for a 10cm complex cyst (hoping for a dermoid so I can gross out my hubby with some teeth and hair *lol*).

For all my prayer warriors... my 2nd case from yesterday DOESN'T know Christ... she has family that does, but has not accepted Him. Please pray that the kindness of strangers here may show her His love in a way that softens her heart and brings her to Him! Her name is Esteban. Pray for all of our patients today that we will see, but I especially feel led to ask for prayer for our little old lady with the VERY large uterus that we are taking out (the size of a 36 wk pregnancy!)... don't know why, just feel wary of it. It is big and will be tough, but something more than that that I can't put my finger on! Sending lots of love to everyone at home!! Tomorrow afternoon we will likely head to Canilla so last full day in Chichi! Its been a great trip! See you soon!