1/28/05 (Friday)

6:45 AM. The sun is rising and it is a new day. Life is already on the move here with roosters crowing and traffic noise. We have a shorter schedule today and hopefully will be done by early afternoon. Jane had two people needing thyroid surgery so she kept Friday and Saturday afternoons open. Neither of these patients have shown up so we may have the afternoon off. Maybe I can get some reading done.

I slept well last night. I went to bed around 10 and then was awakened by dogs barking. There were several and I wonder if some strays came on the property. These dogs barked and barked and must have been moving around the house as the sound seemed to vary in volume. This went on for a long time. After they settled their dispute, all got quiet and the next disturbance was my alarm at 6 AM.

Lord, thank You for this new day. The glory of the sunrise bestows You – Your creation, Your design, Your gift each day. Even the dogs are part of Your design. Thank You, Lord, for Your grace in making this outreach to people possible. Only through You would our hearts, minds and hands be able to do what we do. Lord, I want this work to glorify You, not me. I want the healing to be from You. Lord, thank You for all this effort and experience. I pray for today, Lord. I ask for Your grace to smother this place. Protect our patients and bring healing. Guide our thoughts and hands as we operate again today. Lord, especially be with the lady who is bleeding and is threat of death if nothing is done for her. Help us help her if that is Your will. Lord, she has nothing else. Please guide us in this. Thank You, Lord, for Your bountiful grace and unfailing love! Amen.

1:20 PM. We finished our surgery schedule and are taking the afternoon off. We plan to go into town to look around, have some of Rosa’s ice cream and make a couple phone calls. Our cases went well even though the OR cable can’t be positioned for best exposure. This limits mobility and that gets frustrating for me when I feel cramped while I am trying to see as well as place sutures accurately. Interestingly, we used suction on one case only, the rest we used lap sponges to keep the operative field well exposed.

4:45 PM. We took a trip to town to look around and see the sights. Rob was impressed with the squalor in which people live. It is really an eye opener for me as well. We are so used to the absolute luxury we live in and we have little comprehension of how others live. I got some pictures of various areas of downtown. We stopped at the Hotel Continental and had a dish of Rosa’s ice cream. That was a very tasty treat. Now we are back to relax and let the world go by for awhile.

The pier extending out into the water

Looking down a neighborhood street

A downtown street

Another street view

The main road leading to downtown

Downtown on the waterfront

Lord, I pray for these people who live such hard lives. I pray for Jane and all the hard work she is doing as extension of Your hands. I pray for Angelita, Maria Louisa, Jorge and Gonzolo as they keep the clinic open to serve the people here. Lord, it is a hard work and I am glad to participate in this with Jane. Bless her and her team. Thank You, Lord Jesus, Thank You. Amen.

9:15 PM. Rounds are done and we should see most of our patients going home in the morning…hopefully. One lady was eating soup – chicken soup. I could tell because the meat in the soup was a chicken foot. Now, that’s interesting!

It was fun to sign on to email and read several messages from Phyl and Kim, my daughter. Max and Ben, her sons, were so glad to get an emai from Papaw. Email makes communication from her so much better. Tomorrow we will start rounds early so we can start surgery by 8 AM. Rob leaves around noon and we want to be done by then. Jane and I need to go check on one patient and the I’ll go to bed.

Our patient was an A&P repair. She was in a lot of pain, probably from the vaginal pack. I removed the pack. We didn’t have any rubber gloves so we got a plastic trash bag and I wore it like a glove. This made finding and grabbing the pack an interesting challenge but we made it. I hope this lady does okay and her pain will subisde. I hope this pain is not from a hematoma. These abnormal or exaggerated responses always worry me because they usually are a signal that something is wrong. Sometimes it is a low pain threshold, other times, however, a problems is developing. Lord, protect her please. Help her heal; comfort her and take away her pain. Thank You, Lord Jesus. Amen.