Negro Melo

Monday morning we woke up, ate breakfast and packed up the truck to go to Negro Melo. Along the way we picked up Nicole, Meg, a Dominican doctor (Dr. José) and the translators, Roosevelt and Ricky. To get to Negro Melo, we took the long way up the “better” (aka lessy rocky, but still quite rocky) roads. It’s a small community of about 85 people who basically live along the same street. We were there to serve Negro Melo and Arroyo de Leche, a community which is located 20 minutes further up a hill too steep for trucks to climb.

Once we unloaded into the local church, we started hanging consult room dividers aka bed sheets on strings. The patients who arrived throughout the morning had previously booked appointments. HHI volunteers working in the two towns arranged the appointments based on need: people with hypertension and diabetes were given preference. I worked as an interpreter for Dr. Wes, an ER doctor from Alabama. The first patients we saw had high blood pressure, hernias and seizures. There wasn’t much Dr. Wes could do for them because we don’t have a surgical facility, however he did as much as he could.

Interpreting wasn’t actually as hard as I had imagined it could be, although I did have to explain how a hernia forms and what sinuses are. I had purchased a medical dictionary in Santo Domingo which did come in handy. I only really had trouble understanding the woman who was having seizures, but that’s do to her condition rather than language. After a packed lunch of sandwiches (and a salad bag for me) the clinic held walk-in hours. This was definitely more chaotic as people crowed the doorway trying to get in.

Meg and Laura worked as triage, taking blood pressure and asking medical history. Then the patients moved into one of the three consult rooms and from there to the pharmacy where they were given medicines and then explained how to use them. Throughout the afternoon Dr. Wes saw some children complaining the “gripe” – common cold, patients with anemia, babies who needed vitamins and a girl with a burn on her leg from a motorcycle accident. I explained to them everything he was telling me and relayed their messages back to him. He saw a few women with young babies – mothers my age.

It was a long day. We helped everyone who came to the clinic in whatever way we could. After clinic we came back to Tubagua with Laura, Meg and Nicole for dinner (chicken kabobs, rice, beans, salad, avocado, fried corn meal poppers and bananas for dessert).