D-day

Snowbelle has taken to sleeping in my rucksack...maybe in a vain attempt to stop me leaving the country (or to come with me - ah...if only...do they eat cats in Belize?). Unbeknown to her I have obtained a secret weapon to foil her cunning plan....a suitcase!

Everybody at the walk-in clinic is lovely. The nurses and assistants are amazing and have seen it all before so guess the diagnosis even before you've seen the patient - which is slightly unnerving. But they always keep lots of biscuits in the cupboard which are essential cures for Trudy and my hunger pangs which seem to hit earlier and earlier each day...despite the worms and poo, so we forgive them being way cleverer than us! And then there's Richard our SHO. You can just tell he's going to be a great Haematologist when he 'grows up' - he's got that palliative care kind of an approach to patients with a nice kind voice- kind of the opposite to my rather direct questioning style. We operate a kind of 'good cop - bad cop' clerking technique - but it works...although it occasionally wierds the odd one out if they're on their own.
And he keeps chickens!

Back to D-day....which happens seemingly every other day. It comprises of large numbers of patients all suffering with the same complaint. Diarrhoea. (sigh). Make you happy to see the worms - no really... even though the worms are commonly the course of the squits they are the only light at the end of the tunnel......could there be one...could there?!

Of course there are clues to the cause of all the trouble...in theory. We've had several cases of Giardia none of whom had sulphurous burps or fishy offensive watery stools. Periodic cramping abdominal pain and bilious vomiting seems to point to tapeworm overcrowding...but could also be strongyloides. There are the 'diarrhoea asscoiated with fever' patients who are way more complicated and a bit scarey and finally those who have had something nasty, had it treated but whose guts are still suffering post traumatic stress disorder and still not got with the program. They are hard to treat (and go a bit mad - they carry detailed poo diaries with them), so we send them to the clever Gastro doctors!!


D-days are bad. Luckily my cat is very cute!