In the OR

Just a quick report from the heart of the storm here in Honduras:

It´s been an incredibly busy few days. We have seen and will be treating approximately 80 or 90 patients this week and each day when we arrive there are more waiting to be seen, in the hopes that they can be squeezed in. The patients we are treating are here for hand and arm treatment. Sometimes this is a congenital defect, like a little boy we saw yesterday, who was born with polydactyly--extra fingers. In his case it was a thumb with two ends on one of his hands. Today we saw a boy with syndactyly--he was born with his ring and pinky fingers grown together; the doctors separated them. We´ve also seen deformations as a result of car accidents, falls out of trees or off of roofs, falls onto glass or rocks while playing soccer, and one snake bite. But by far the cases we see most often are machete wounds. The ones we see are self-defense wounds across the hands, from victims of an attempted robbery or attack. Some of the cases are heartbreaking.

I am busy! I spend my day translating with patients going into or out of the ER, talking to the nurses from the hospital which is hosting our group, or else working on paperwork for the upcoming patients. But in my free time, I get my mask on and go into the OR to watch the surgeons work. It´s so fascinating. I could spend all day describing the procedures I´ve been watching.

Internet time is limited so I won´t be able to write more until I get back, but then I´ll have lots of stories and lots of pictures. Some will be kind of gory, but I won´t post them here.