On Thursday March 13, 2014 we moved some of the supplies from our headquarters at Fuafeh’s to the District Hospital. We had been planning this mission to coincide with the Anyoutah Lewoh but as Providence will have it, this mission was a necessity. As we arrived Lewoh, we got news that the community has been without a doctor for months. The resident doctor of the Lewoh is married to the resident doctor of Alou and so she lives in Alou. She has been on maternity for who knows how long. How our people have been fairing without a doctor for months still baffles my imagination and bares testimony to the fact that God has been working and continues to work over-time here.
As our pick-up truck approached the hospital, it was bustling with people from the main grounds to the entrance and on the sides and inside of the building. News had spread like wild fire of our arrival and people had camped out as early as 7:00 am. As we settled in , a motor-cycle pulled up and the gentleman who alighted from it, introduced himself as Dr. Fossouo Deffo Emmanuel. Dr. Fossou Deffo is the resident doctor of Alou hospital and husband to the resident doctor of Lewoh who is on leave. We were happy to hear that he will be assisting the team.
With the assistance of the medical staff of the hospital, we were able to set up a reception table and three rooms for the doctors. Our lab technician settled into the laboratory with the nurse and the resident “pharmacist” and midwife setup station in the hallway ready to dispense medications. The process went as follows, a medical staff called the patient’s name from a heap of hospital books that were on a desk, the patient is directed to one of the doctors for consultation; if the doctor determined that further tests were needed, the patient was sent to the laboratory; the patient returned to the doctor for diagnosis and prescriptions. With prescriptions in hand, the patient then comes to the pharmacy table to receive supplies of medications. With the process in motion, I decided to take a walk around the hospital. The doctor’s residence that we had worked hard to renovate and equip with a water system toilet seats uninhabited. The maternity ward that we also worked hard to realize seats unused because the contractor, one of Lebialem’s paramount rulers, I was told, did not build it to specification. The current maternity ward is still in the state I met in 2009. How mother and child have gotten out of here alive after delivery only God knows.
The malaria test kits we were to get from Buea were expired so they were not brought to Lewoh. We however did get the HIV test kits. The doctors nevertheless did malaria tests at the cost 500 frs with the test kits that we bought from the hospital’s supply. At 3 pm the team had not had lunch. The abeh nchi that had been prepared by Mami Monica at Nkemateh’s had to be transported to the hospital for the doctors to have lunch. After consultations resumed, I hurried down to GTTC Lewoh to attend the LECUDEM Executive meeting. I returned at 9 pm to find the team still at work dispensing medications using a touch light as the lighting at the hospital did not extend to our make-shift pharmacy. After a delicious dinner from our hostesses, the team hit the main square to join in Cameroon’s favorite past-time– beer drinking and dancing.
Submitted by Nkemajiawung Fondungallah
