Novices pali and Somxai are fab

I'm flying to Sydney for a one month holiday, yippeeee.
Novices Pali and Somxai asked that I come to the temple before my flight.
When I arrived they had their certificates for completing their English course, which I sponsor, and for summer school at the hospital, very proud of them.
They asked that we take photos together and then gave a blessing of thanks for their achievements, for my support and to keep me happy and safe on my trip.
I was so thrilled and tingled from head to toe, they're great

goodbyes

Margaret and Krisy are heading home to Canada, don't leave us, and I'm heading to Oz for a month's holiday, lucky boy, so time for a wee cocktail, yippee

dr cheri has a new scooter

bicycles are the go for all the expats at the hospital but for her on call night cheri wanted to feel safer so bought a scooter. her daughter was checking out her driving lessons expertly given by biker jenn!

new clothes

Corrie and Alison both brought a suitcase of children's clothes on their recent holidays.
And now I'm enjoying distributing to them to some very deserving Laotian children.
Glad to see some London T-shirts in Luang Prabang!
But we're already running low on supplies so we need more visitors and more goodies ....

occupational health

We set up an occupational health service for the Laotian team at LFHC, I sent our proposed action plan to Vientiane and the feedback I received was that this was 'pioneering in Laos'!
Anyway we've test the staff for important infections and vaccinate them against others.
Here are 2 of the nurses helping me vaccinate our new laboratory technician.

Mailor and Kurlee

Dr Mailor and Nurse Kurlee worked together this week, they're a great team and combined their knowledge and clinical skills to help our patients. They were my favourites this week (naughty teacher) but I had a lovely time working with them

Novice Vanh's summer school experience

Novice Vanh spent his fortnight at LFHC 'summer school for tomorrow's doctors'
Entry to medical school in Laos is more difficult than in the developed countries so it's going to be tough. He would be a wonderful doctor, Vanh is bright, caring, sensitive, wise, perceptive and can talk to anyone. During his 2 weeks his interest was sparked in other healthcare professions which is great but his heart is in medicine, he'd love to be a doctor to help his family and community in Northern Laos. I have been trying to gentle add reality to his ideals so there has been some sadness in his eyes but he's bounced back with 'i know getting to medical school is almost impossible but i want to try and if you want something you have to go for it'.
I'm going to be doing lots of studying with him over the next year, we're going for it

party girls

Margaret and Kristy had a fabby party - where cultural differences in partying become apparent, the Laotians all arrived on time at 7, ate food, wowed with their line dancing and all left en masse at 9.30. whereas the expats rock up late, drink heaps and raise eye-brows with their dancing, i must learn some new moves!
Loved the party, love M&K

new glasses

my vision has deteriorated so much in the last year, the joys of middle age.
reading glasses are wonderful but fliping heck it's all blurry when you look at people or into the distance so my glasses are up and down like a yoyo and I keep finding them in different places around the hospital or other people wearing them

open kitchen

now that the ward is open so is the kitchen as patients cook their own meals
lovely to see the kitchen in action

i'm on my knees ....

.... where i do my best work!
was adding helena and adam's educational leaflets about nutrition, oral health, breast feeding, thalassaemia and smoking to our existing ones for easy use in the clinic

the camera is an ice-breaker

can't understand why children are scared of me, often there are startled faces!
but they love taking pictures with my camera and then there's smiles or calmness.

happy people

the in-patient ward is up and running, a new dimension of care we can bring and we have a new medical director, dr siobhan, yippee, we are a happy bunch at LFHC.

Margaret and Kristy

Margaret and Kristy are wonderful people, they are pharmacists and spent 2 months volunteering at LFHC.They have huge experience in their field both in patient care and strategic planning.
They had so much helpful and thoughtful advice for the pharmacy and LFHC as a whole - fabulous wisdom, perspective, and they strengthened relationships amongst the team. And Margaret and Kristy are heaps of fun and took great photos! here are some of them.
Nah, our Laotian pharmacist, has developed confidence with yours and Shayna's guidance, she's beaming.
Come back very soon

the team is growing

now that the ward is open we need to think about the next steps at LFHC.
next on the agenda is high dependency and A&E.
so we need some more clinicians, 4 new doctors are starting in september.
here's Megan, a volunteer nurse from America, teaching 2 of the new nurses.
and we have our new medical director siobhan and the lab team is expanding too