Sleepy Tuesday...Sleepy Every Day....

First, Happy Nurses' Week!

Nurses' Week is May 6th-12th.

It's been a crazy but exciting first 10 days.  Everyone has one thing in common....



I think we can ALL fall asleep anywhere...and we do...

Tuesday, May 7th

Today Jakarelly, Casey, Sondra, Michael, Charity, James, Matt, and Rebekah all went to the community. We are checking the kids' height, weight, hair, teeth, and hemoglobin in different schools. In past evaluations of the kids, they noticed a lot of kids with anemia.  Interventions were initiated and now we are seeing if they are helping the kids.  The sad part is the kids have to have their finger poked to get a drop of blood for the hemoglobin test.  They start crying when you are taking their weight, because they know what comes next...

Brittney, Mandy, Paige, Sarah, and I (Melina) went to Luis Vernaza.  Sarah, Paige, and I were on a Womens' Medical-Surgical floor while Brittney and Mandy went to the Burn Unit and the Emergency Room.  Sarah, Paige, and I spent hours assessing the patients, taking vital signs, and talking to them.  We were stopped by a nun that was going around praying for the patients.  She wanted to know where we were from and let us know what good nuns we would be.  She was really nice and shared some of her story of why she decided to be a nun.  We were kept busy with learning from the doctors, watching various procedures, and an older patient pulling out her IV and bleeding every where.

Mandy and Brittney saw a patient on the Burn Unit with Steven-Johnson's Syndrome.  If you would like to see pictures...Here is a link to various pictures from Google...but WARNING...they are gross...

https://www.google.com.ec/search?hl=en&gs_rn=12&gs_ri=psy-ab&tok=t9Irk526nZVh2P7_M-WAfg&cp=8&gs_id=v&xhr=t&q=steven+johnsons+syndrome&bav=on.2,or.r_cp.r_qf.&bvm=bv.46226182,d.dmg&biw=1006&bih=637&um=1&ie=UTF-8&tbm=isch&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi&ei=myGLUe3IL4fW9ASiw4D4AQ

They said the patient's skin was red and peeling, and his mouth was bloody.

On a happier note, Shelly, Anna, Chelsea, Emilee, Greg, Liz, and Mykenna were at the Pediatric Hospital.

After we made it back from the different hospitals, we split up and some of us went with the "Municipio" or Municipal of Guayaquil to a school for children who are blind and deaf and others went to the "Junta" which is the private non-profit charity institution that we work with to be able to visit the hospitals.

They explain who they are on their website...Here is a short excerpt:

WHO WE ARE

Junta de Beneficencia de Guayaquil (JBG) is a private non-profit charity institution founded in 1888, which has provided social care to millions of low-income Ecuadorians in areas such as health care, education, care for the elderly and funeral services. We have thus become Ecuador's largest NGO, and the only one of its kind in Latin America, which fills us with pride and serves as encouragement for us to continue helping those in need through our massive charity work.

We are committed to society to improve the quality of life of those who are not covered by public or private health care, or those who do not have access to education due to the extreme poverty. We offer individuals a wide range of health services from experienced medical professionals, with high-tech equipment and the appropriate infrastructure to meet their needs with quality and warmth.

They thanked us for our service here in Ecuador and gave everyone scarfs.  It's amazing, because the President of the company is retired.  He had a cement pipe business and now volunteers as the President of this organization.  It was a great opportunity to meet and talk to them.  

At the school for children who are blind and deaf we taught the teachers and other school employees CPR, First Aid, and Nutrition.  We had the teachers get up and demonstrate CPR to the beat of "Superstition" by Stevie Wonder and a great classic "Stayin' Alive."     

We also had a health fair in a Stake Center that was supposed to start at 7:30 pm, but we got a late start.  It was a great success though.  We were able to do a lot of teaching and meet a member of the church who had been run over by a train when he was 11 years old in Columbia yet he had the best attitude and outlook.  He was recognized for breaking a record swimming across the Guayas River and keep in mind he only has one full limb (his right arm).