Hey everybody, Farhan here on a beautiful Monday afternoon in Accra. It's great here. I was talking to the Benster over the weekend and we both decided that something that is way way overdue on this blog is the hospitality of the Ghanaian people. It's really incredible. We are staying with the family that runs this school/clinic and they are treating us like kings. They feed us way too much food and treat us like family. And one big difference between Ghanaians and us is their level of companionship (I guess thats the best way to put it). They just hang out. Whenever one of them brings us food, even though they don't know us they don't just drop off food and leave. They hang out and chat with us until we're done. And man is the food over here great. Our hosts are making sure that we get to try lots of authentic Ghanaian dishes. It's great. Lots of fish. Lots of corn type stuff that's ground up. It's very different from American and Pakistani food. Its one of my favorite parts of this trip. Every morning they all come up to our floor of the house and hang out while we eat breakfast. They turn on the tv and come up to our floor and watch rather than watching on their own tv. It's great. It's like having a family here. And over the weekend they spent a lot of time with us (details of the weekend will be posted later by my Caucasian counterpart). They are incredible people. Every member of the family is involved in keeping this school going and each of them has a different role. One person is the headmaster of the school, another does all the computer and technical stuff, several others are teachers, other cook the food, etc. It's a huge family and they're all involved. They make such a huge difference in the lives of these kids (and the community overall) but if you talk to them about it they all just brush it off as if its nothing. We come over here for a month and we feel all good about ourselves, but they have been doing this everyday for ten years. To them I think this is more responsibility than altruism. They're incredible. I have a lot to learn from them. I feel very privileged to be able to hang out with them for a month.
The kiddos at the school never cease to amaze us. Man they're great. They're hyper like crazy. One just walked up to Ben right now and said, "I've heard of Santa Claus and I want to know what he is and if he's real." Ha ha. Classic. Then he got asked if we use caning in the U.S. to discipline children and why or why not. To which, after stuttering for about 10 seconds, he replied,"People in America, we...ummm...like to sue each other a lot." Haha. A girl walked up to me very embarrassed this morning and asked to speak to me alone. Long story short, I explained to her for the first time what menstruation is. Oh well. We found out today that most of them have some type of medical record kept at a nearby community clinic. One of the nurses came by today and asked us to come and check the clinic out on Thursday so we're going to do that. And tomorrow a community physician is going to show us around one of the local hospitals. Next week we go to the orphanage. The disparity in healthcare compared to the United States is amazing. One of the parents wanted to speak to Ben and I this morning to get a second opinion about her daughter. Before meeting with the girl's mother we got to meet the girl. After talking to her for a few minutes it seemed to Ben and I that she had mental retardation (or at least acted similarly to every patient we have seen with mental retardation). When we finally met her mother she confirmed this to us. She also told us that she has been having seizures once a month since she was a baby and never has been put on anti-epileptic medication. She said that she had seen a few doctors about it but none of them ever mentioned it to her. So her daughter has just been seizing for the last 13 years (she's 15 now and has not had a seizure for 2 years). Her mother described the seizures to us as full Grand Mal Seizures. The last doctor she saw was a homeopathic doctor who told her that her daughter has a brain infection and then gave her a shot that he told her would boost her IQ. He also recommended a high protein diet to fight the infection. Amazing. I reassured her that her child does not have have a brain infection, and told her to take her to a neurologist (there's only one in town apparently). She told me that would be tough financially. So I told her that since she has not had a seizure in 2 years she would probably be ok, but if it were my child I would definitely find a way to see a neurologist. She said she would take her. What a difference...if it were my child she would have seen a neurologist 15 years ago.





A case of scabies. It looks a lot worse in real life. Unfortunately we have nothing here that will treat scabies so this kiddo is still running around with this on his hands. Fun Fun!






Some of the kiddos that we saw last week are improving. It seems like lots of them have poor diets. I spoke with the founder of the Adakum foundation two nights ago and he told me about some of the initiatives that they're planning and I was able to change his mind on a few issues that I thought would be of little benefit and talk him into others that might be of more help. Ben and I are really the only medical people behind this organization right now, which makes me really nervous because we're just medical students. And even though this is not a hospital or even a full clinic, education and health care are so mixed in this setting that there should be someone with medical expertise on the board of the Adakum Foundation.
But anyway, thanks for all the e-mails of support and comments on the blog. I loved reading them. More to come. Peace Out