Mbarara

After an eventful 6 hours on the bus (after it broke down three times the engine was jerry-rigged with a rope--yes, a rope, only.) we made it from Entebbe to Mbarara. We arrived here on Sunday afternoon, in time to get situated and make the best guacamole I've ever eaten (seriously, the avocados here are amazingly good). Monday morning we dragged our three 50 lbs bags across the street to the hospital to give out supplies. We met with Hope, the head nurse on the Labor and delivery/Maternity ward, so that she could help us determine where the supplies would be most useful/where to store everything.

So far, we have been especially excited to have the dopplers working (we brought 2 new ones that were purchased with donated money, and were also able to fix the doppler that Kelly Jensen (now Watson!) brought last time---apparently the battery had died and that is why it wasn't being used. Luckly we had packed a bag full of replacement batteries). We've also been able to use the reusable ambu bag to recusitate 2 babies thus far.

The other supplies have been greatly appreciated (especially the gloves and hand sanitizer) by the nurses, doctors, and medical students. At the same time, Kari and I have been learning to do things the Ugandan way: starting IVs with gloves for turniquets, cutting umbilical cords with razor blades, deep suctioning with a bulb syringe, baging with room air when there is no oxygen, working through power outages (being laughed at while using a headlamp to start an IV in the dark).

We have been dividing our time between helping out/learning on the delivery ward and working on improvement projects (we're currently trying to work with one of the anesthesiologists to set up a recusitation table in the delivery ward). Yesterday we got the chance to teach a class at the nursing school too...so we've sort of been all over the place, but we've been learing a lot and meeting super friendly nurses and doctors with great stories all along the way.

I'll leave you with one of the two words I've learned in Runyankole:

Agandi

(it actually means "how are you", but I have no idea how to say goodbye, or until next time, or peace out, so Agandi will have to do. In case you were wondering the other word I know is Sindica, which means "push" (it might be the most helpful word in our field)