Workshop 1

We are so pleased to be able to blog about our first workshop. It took place on Saturday (21 July) at the youth centre within Mulanje Mission. We had planned it to run from 9-10am and had been assured we would have over 50 people attending. So, in true organised fashion, we turned up at the youth centre at half past 8 to meet the two student nurses from Mulanje Mission Nursing College - Juliana and Peter - and make final preparations etc.

By 9am we were ready to go and waited patiently for our workshop attendees. We were still waiting (although perhaps slightly less patiently) at 10am and we had a total head count of 2! However, our fellow student nurses didn't seem phased by this and sure enough at around half 10 (only an hour and a half late), the hall very quickly filled with over 50 participants. The age range was wider than we had anticipated and ranged from 7 years to late teens early twenties. Once everyone was settled we wasted no time in getting the workshop under way.

We split the larger group into two and asked these smaller groups to come up with a team name.Very quickly we had the Winners group and the Understanding group. With our groups settled and team names chosen we began the first activity.

The activities we chose aimed to encourage open discussion about HIV and AIDs topics.

Activity 1 - What is HIV and who can get it?

Activity 2 - Transmission and prevention  of HIV

Activity 3 - HIV testing

During each activity we equipped each group with pictures in order to help facilitate discussion. For example, we gave each group a selection of pictures representing various different people including a nurse, a farmer, a business man, a baby, a hospital patient etc, and asked them to discuss which of these people can contract HIV.   As well as using the pictures, we went round each group and tried to facilitate discussion by asking questions and provoking debate.

At the end of each activity, each group was asked to feedback to the larger group so that everyone could benefit from the answers the group had come up with. The feedback provided from each group was of a really high standard. Many of the participants were willing to stand up and talk in front of the group and provided really good points. A nice aspect of the workshops was with the wide age range, we found the older participants made an effort to include the younger ones and the in turn the younger children were able to gain some of the knowledge from them. 

At the end of the activities we had a quiz with a mix of questions related to HIV and some general knowledge questions. Both groups did extremely well, with the Understanding group getting 11 out of 12 and the Winners groups (appropriately named) winning with 12 out of 12. The winning team were presented with their prize of a crate of fanta and all the participants from both groups were presented with a certificate of attendance.

We finished off the first workshop in true Malawian style with some music, and of course, some dancing. 

From what we gathered everyone really enjoyed the workshop and after recovering from all the dancing, we are looking forward to round two, taking place on Saturday and we are hopeful people might only be an hour late this time!

On duty

So we are continuing our placements on the male ward and female ward at Mulanje Mission Hospital. This week was out first full week on duty. Like the other nurses we are working 7am - 5pm with an hour for lunch and a half an hour tea break. We are both feeling much more settled in our wards, getting to know the staff really well, who have taken us under their wing, and getting used to the different way of working.

There are often quiet times on the ward. In the UK, much of this time would be taken up with personal care of the patient, but as mentioned, each patient here has a guardian who is responsible for washing and feeding etc. However, things soon become very busy when somebody is admitted. On the male ward, men often only come to hospital when they are already very ill. It is a last resort for them. It means that during admission there are lots of things going on, usually a clinician is assessing them, while the nurses are carrying out malaria tests, inserting cannulas, administering IV fluids and  taking blood glucose measurements. Everyone is busy doing something and there is usually many family members in the room at the same time, so it can be difficult to work. Also, its not unusual to run out of the basic supplies such as gauze, some IV fluids, pain killers or you'll discover the piece of equipment you have spent 5 minutes looking for has run out of battery. Despite all these hurdles, the nurses together with the doctors and clinicians deliver excellent care here.

We have organised our workshops to take place at the local youth centre and we are currently waiting to hear back which students from the nursing college will be helping out. We are hoping the workshops get under way very soon.

Mulanje Mission Hospital.

We arrived in Malawi on Tuesday, after travelling since Sunday night. On Wednesday we explored the hospital and local area. The hospital is made up of several buildings, each housing a different ward, there are also out-patient, radiography and theatre buildings. The buildings all look fairly new and are nice and cool inside. The equipment is more basic, X-rays are manually developed in a dark room and there is often a shortage of supplies. Things are re-used here, where we have cardboard and plastic in the UK they have metal which is washed and re-used.

We started placement on Thursday, I am currently in the female ward and Lynsey is in the male ward. I had a quiet first shift, there was only six patients. Nursing here is different from Scotland as here patients have Guardians who are responsible for feeding and cleaning them, so there is slightly less for the nurses to do. I observed one admission, here the student nurses cannulate and have more responsibility for the patients. The language barrier is a slight issue as many of the patients do not speak English, luckily though the staff are more than happy to translate and we will always be working alongside a nurse anyway. Friday was a busier shift, I got to do two I.M injections and assisted with an emergency admission. A women came in having a severe asthma attack, the hospital currently has no inhalers or nebulizers which would be the best course of treatment, instead we used I.V medication and admitted her for further treatment and observation.

We discussed our project with the medical director who seemed very positive about it. She is going to talk to the local nursing college to hopefully team us up with some local nursing students. It is likely we will hold our workshops at the nearby secondary school, as this age group has an increasing number of cases of HIV. The students are also taught in English which is very helpful as it will be easier to lead discussions with them.