Where have I been? In rural Swaziland. I have spent the last 2 weeks covering our clinic in Hlatikulu, a very small rural town in the southern part of the country. This area is unique because of the extreme poverty and the multi drug resistant TB that has pervaded much of this region of Swaziland. In fact, there is so much of a problem that MSF (Doctors without Borders) has planned a large upscaling of TB treatment in the region. Its a bit odd, but we sometimes send our MDR TB suspects from the capital city Mbabane to this hospital in the middle of nowhere, just so they can be seen by the MSF doctors.
Anyways, we have a small clinic on this hospital campus that has just been built there that is staffed by one of our doctors. Well, sure enough, Day 2 of my time there, a mother arrives on our newly opened "Satellite Clinic" doorsteps with her child who is huffing and puffing away. Like any MDR TB patient, he gets daily injections and a bunch of very toxic medicines daily for 6 months, along of course with his ARVs (anti- retroviral medicines). TB takes so long to treat that there will be many more months of uncertainty with his respiratory status; lets hope he is strong enough to pull through.
3 comments:
Love the work you are doing, Stephanie!
Did we drive by this town on our way south to Sodwana?
Keep up the great work!
Hi Heather...Surprisingly we did not pass this town (although it looks like any other small town in Swaziland). It is more South Central than where we were. About an hour and a half from Mbabane (then again...everything is about an hour and a half away).
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