Sabi Dis?

Thursday

Today, since we could not work at the clinic, we decided to use the time to compile information about the need for first aid education in this area. To help support our theory that first aid education is lacking and contributes to more severe complications of wounds, we took a simple survey. We walked along the roads of Kabala randomly asking school aged children if they recognized a bandaid. ("Sabi dis?") We showed them a wrapped bandaid and an unwrapped bandaid to see their response. We recorded their age, sex and response. After gathering a statistical sample, we found that 76.6% of school-aged children surveyed on the streets of Kabala did not recognize what a bandaid was. The few that did recognize it called it a "plaster." This supports our concept that if they do not recognize what a bandaid is, they have never used one to protect a wound.

We have even realized in our work both in the clinic and outside of the clinic that people are enamored by the sight of a bandaid. When you clean and dress a wound, they stare in fascination of what you are doing. Even when we stopped on the the side of a road to fix a boys foot, a crowd gathered around to watch us clean it, but also pointed and touched the bandaid as if they had never seen anything like it.

In order to support our theory that these simple wounds can develope into complex problems like Jungle Ulcers because of lack of first aid knowledge and access to basic first aid supplies, we want to gather some statistics at the clinic. Starting on Monday we plan to review patient files to gather data on preventable infections. We also plan to conduct short interviews with people to see what would be their first response to a cut or burn. We are told that often native medicine is attempted first, but when it fails they go to a clinic. However, as we have seen, the infections can be major and disfiguring.