Resilient Doc’s Blog

Trying to set a line in neonate meningitis admission

My ineffectiveness today can only partially be blamed on my massive hang over. To be honest, I almost didn’t come in today, but I couldn’t just skip out simply because I chose to stay up all night drinking and gisting. But, my ineffectiveness can also be blamed on the overall festive atmosphere that surrounded my fellow house officers today. People showed up late and we were all around giddy today. There wasn’t much that needed to be done today. We were discharging a lot of patients, and it was my last day. I had to leave particularly early today because my Uncle F. called a board meeting for NELA and he wanted myself and Tinuke to be inducted as board members at this meeting. So, today was a half day in which nothing was really accomplished.

I met Tinuke at her clinic as she was seeing a man with a wicked leg ulcer that has to be malignant by now. See picture below. He has had his leg like that for two years and didn’t come see a doctor because it only caused him some mild itching. The interesting thing is that it wasn’t the “ulcer” on his leg that brought him in. It was his two week history of hematochezia. Further history revealed weight loss and anorexia. P.E showed massive hepatomegaly and Jaundice. Tinuke and I both agreed that there had to be some kind of malignancy going on here, but the question is, where to refer him to get a more extensive work up? Oddly enough the choice was btw dermatology or plastic surgery, not internal medicine. She explained to me that those two departments would be the ones that have to do the leg work before IM could delve down a more extensive diagnostic rout. So yeah, it was pretty interesting and I will have to ask my cuz/sis what the old man ended up having.

We left for Ibadan latter than we should have and were amazingly late for the board meeting. We were inducted and discussed the future of NELA. My uncle wants to move away from being an HIV NGO entity because of the scam NGOs that are out there, that are turning HIV/AIDS into a profit for themselves and not the people that actually need it. We talked about what our roles will be ( I will most likely be useless for the next three years, but I am hoping only 1.50) and what we could and should bring to the new NELA. Essentially my concern as I walked away was that I fear that if we become concerned with NELA sustaining itself and being less reliant on international funding and grants, then we will be shifting our emphasis from serving the ones that need it most and improving the health system of Nigeria and worrying about sustaining NELA. Money just corrupts. My uncle and I agree that having a foundation would be the best solution, but we are a long way away from having the money that would support it. I know that that is where I will come in, and I am excited because I love raising money for a good cause. I just don’t want to manage it. I want my uncle to have a good trust worthy person to manage the foundation because, well, lets be honest. Money corrupts and Nigerians have a reputation of being easily corruptible.

So yeah, here ends my three week at Ile ife.

Leg Ulcer? Yeah right!