10:10pm     Murhuru Bay Health Center: Today was one of those difficult days.  Today I saw AIDS at its worst.  Patients seen today were mostly stage 3 and 4, 1 and 2 were asked to come back on Thursday because they were not as severe.  First we took blood samples of about 15 patients to send it to the lab in Kisumu to get their CD4 count, the results will be available by next week depending on if their machines are working.  I labeled test tubes and filled out the lab reports and other paperwork while continuously asking questions about each patient and having the “doctor” translate.  Some patients bodies were so wasted away that it was very difficult to find good veins and to draw enough blood to fill a 2 test tubes.  Very hard to watch as they cringe while he moves the needle around inside their arm to find a vein.  Each patient is then met with individually, check their current health; new or reoccurring symptoms such as weight loss, oral thrush, rash, fever, etc.  A brief physical exam is given, the “doctor” leans over the desk and feels the patients stomach, neck, listens to the lungs with the stethoscope, looks inside the mouth.  New medications or refills are prescribed and picked up on the other side of the room at the pharmacy.  The nurses will do home visits on Friday to see the patients that are too weak to leave their homes. 

I felt tears well up when a 19 yr old girl came in with her baby; both HIV positive.  From looking at the child I would have guessed he was a few weeks old, but come to find out that he is one year old.  The chances of his survival are minimal, he’s even too tiny to draw blood from.  I took a break to go work with the lab technician; malaria, malaria, malaria. I was feeling just miserable.  This hospital has solar panels but the batteries are dead.  The lab tech uses a microscope with a mirror on the bottom that uses the sunlight.  And we can get blood results back in a matter of minutes with the healthcare in the States.  It really is the little things that matter.