Good day to rest tired legs...so what do we do? Yes, hike up to Kunde at 12,000 feet to visit the Kunde Hospital where team members Mike, Joe & Nick are performing cardiac scans on Sherpa teenagers.
The hospital is the main facility in the area, staffed by two Sherpa doctors & serves a population of approximately 4,000 villagers. Given the terrain it is rather isolated but does offer basic care: essentially primary care but also emergency care. I was interested to know how they dealt with orthopedic injuries such as fractures. They have X-ray but treat nearly all fractures with closed reductions. Anything more technical than that needs treatment only available in Kathmandu which is considered too expensive by most villagers. So most of the reductions are performed by (blind) nerve blocks and/or ketamine. By his own admission, the success rate of the blocks was pretty low. As the doctor gave me a tour of his hospital we came across a new Toshiba ultrasound machine used for obstetric scans. Even if the probe was low frequency & not ideally suited to nerve blocks, I suggested that its use for femoral nerve blocks may be better than the blind technique. He thought that it was a good idea, so perhaps he will try it next time!
Out in the grounds of the hospital we found Ike trying to satisfy his curiosity as to how the round dish focused the sun's rays...
Back in Namche I had the opportunity to see how my physiology was doing:
The hospital is the main facility in the area, staffed by two Sherpa doctors & serves a population of approximately 4,000 villagers. Given the terrain it is rather isolated but does offer basic care: essentially primary care but also emergency care. I was interested to know how they dealt with orthopedic injuries such as fractures. They have X-ray but treat nearly all fractures with closed reductions. Anything more technical than that needs treatment only available in Kathmandu which is considered too expensive by most villagers. So most of the reductions are performed by (blind) nerve blocks and/or ketamine. By his own admission, the success rate of the blocks was pretty low. As the doctor gave me a tour of his hospital we came across a new Toshiba ultrasound machine used for obstetric scans. Even if the probe was low frequency & not ideally suited to nerve blocks, I suggested that its use for femoral nerve blocks may be better than the blind technique. He thought that it was a good idea, so perhaps he will try it next time!
Out in the grounds of the hospital we found Ike trying to satisfy his curiosity as to how the round dish focused the sun's rays...
Back in Namche I had the opportunity to see how my physiology was doing:
- SpO2 88%
- HR 98
- ET CO2 30
- RR 16
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