3 November, Wednesday

We stopped at a pharmacy on the way to Thor and bought some liquid antibiotics and other things that we were needing yesterday.  Our medical clinic got started a bit later then, at 10:15.  And, we had to knock off at 12:30 because of a scheduled visit to a mountain top a couple of hours away.  Still, we saw 35 patients in 2 hours.  That pace was ahead of the number that we were seeing yesterday, so you can tell that we're getting better at this.  The sickest person today was a woman of 67 years age, complaining of difficulty climbing up and down the very steep and very high hills around here.  Her blood pressure was very wide, 187/78, and sure enough, there was a loud holodiastolic murmur over her aortic valve.  She needs an aortic valve replacement.  She won't be able to get one. She will very likely be dead in less than a year. We didn't tell her.
After clinic, the pastor (Pastor Michel) thanked us profusely, especially for the kind way we had treated the people of his neighborhood.  He was very grateful.  His wife is a nurse, and she helped us.  His daughter learned to speak English on her own, and she helped as a translator.  They were a splendid family.  He told us how difficult it was for him after the earthquake, because his daughter was almost killed.  She was trapped in their collapsed home, and it took 20-30 min to get her out.  That doesn't sound like much at first, but we need to recall that the earthquake killed over 230,000 people here.  The scope of destruction remains very evident, and it had to be absolutely terrifying for him.  He looks forward to our return in February.

We spent most of the afternoon driving up a steep, winding (and terrible) road to near a mountain top. Had lunch there, at 2:30.

Must run off to a team meeting!  No rain yet, but the sky is cloudy tonight.