Overseas Doctors

Today I walked in to work to find my health center a total madhouse! Not only did we have the usual, approximately fifty mothers with their babies for check ups and vaccines (all of whom I had to personally weigh and measure) but we had a team of doctors from “overseas” (read America) who sent out an open invitation to all of Linden to come to a general outpatient clinic.

Now, there is something about the word “overseas” that makes “sick” people come out of the freaking woodworks. That is why he had over 150 people show up to the advertised clinic!!! 150+!!! So, after we wrapped up the infant/child clinic around noon, I stepped over to see what was going on with the overseas folks. I expected to find fewer people waiting in the waiting area, but NO! There were MORE! I went inside the room they were working in and there were only three nurses doing basic patient intake (name, age, BP, glucose reading, general triage stuff) and there was only ONE doctor. Get that ONE doctor. This ONE man was planing on personally seeing 150 people. In. One. Day. He was on number 18 when I check at noon. The craziest part wasn't how many people he was willing to see. To me, the craziest part is that people were willing to sit there from 8am to 5pm and on (when I finally left clinic and there were still 50+ people) waiting to see him!

Why? Why would people wait such a long time to see a doctor? Were the struck with dire and mysterious illness? No! In fact, we have a Medex at my health centre who can personally see you any day of the week and diagnose and treat most ailments. If she can't treat you, she will send you five minutes down the road to the hospital, where multiple doctors (many of them Cuban trained) will see you within a few hours. Most of the people in the waiting room already had been diagnosed with common problems (diabetes and hypertension) or, when I asked them why they needed to see Doctor, they said for a cold. A COLD! There were seriously people who had been waiting for 8 hours, in a steaming hot waiting area with no food and no water to see an US doctor for a cold.

I wanted to scream at most everyone. This doctor did not have a magic wand. He did not tell most patients anything that the patients (and we, their primary care providers) did not already know. And, for the most part, he did not give out any medicines that we don't prescribe for free in the pharmacy in our clinic. So why? I am still flabbergasted.

Basically I spent the rest of the day triaging the patients (something the nurses, both American and Guyanese) were not doing. I made sure the diabetic patients who I know have serious sugar problems, were given priority, because none of them had brought snacks to the clinic with them and were on the verge of diabetic comas (aaahhhh, are you serious people?!?!?). Also I made sure people who were in physical pain at that moment (girl who had mystery neck pain and was passing out, and a man with stomach pain and typhoid) get in to see the Doc first. What a totally crazy day.

Like I said, I left at 5. The medex, pharmacist and a few other health workers had to stay behind. The Doctor and his medical team said they would work as late as necessary to see everyone. I feel sorry for my coworkers, because they, like me, know that half the people in the waiting room, who were keeping everyone else from going home to their dinners, didn't need the attention of a doctor at all. The medical team felt obligated to help everyone who came to the doctor because in American people usually just seek the services of a doctor when they know that something is really wrong with them. The same is true in Guyana; people only go see a doctor if they really, really need medical attention. You would never see a Guyanese person waiting 8 hours in the Linden hospital for 8 hours unless there was a dire emergency. Unless, of course, it is an “overseas” doctor.