Burns

Burns are dreaded in a developing world hospital. Frequent, preventable, resource exhausting, poor outcomes are terms that all come to mind.

For example, my first experience with this plague in Togo back in 2004 - I nicknamed her Ms. Feisty b/c of her spitfire personality and loud protest of our painful care of her wounds. As a naive medical student I became very attached to this girl and actually thought she would survive until one day I noticed that a pseudomonas infection rapidly turned her skin grafts into mush. Late that same night she died. I helped her mom but a pink dress on her burned dead body. I walked past her burial spot near the hospital the other day. That girl took a piece out of me.

A nearly identical experience at Tenwek in Kenya in 2008 left me more pessimistic. Others wanted to write off a badly burned girl who needed a tracheotomy. I plowed ahead and perseverated over her post-op care. One night while I was sleeping her tracheostomy plugged from dried secretions (no moisturized air in the primitive ventilator circuit there). Her ICU bed was empty the following morning - proving me wrong again.

So, you might imagine the sensation in my chest when I stumbled across this boy on rounds on my first day here. He was burned over the face from a hot liquid at a funeral ceremony - that was all of the story that I could understand. I would describe it as choking down tears trying to well up all the way from my heart.

Duplicate that sensation when I saw this mother (blue shirt) in this same position (hours apart) praying over her burnt son in the pediatrics ward. He had carried fuel for a generator, spilled some on his clothes and then ignited in a clothes distribution when he started the generator. 

Over the course of my work here he turned septic with high fevers - consuming much of our limited supply and most powerful antibiotics. I just asked God to please honor the prayers of this pleading mother. Because she is from Ghana and speaks English, I developed a special relationship with her. That boy is indebted to his mother.

Well - prayer was mercifully answered and meticulous burn care was rewarded.

See the boy with the face burns at time of discharge (he required no skin grafts!). His pigment should come back with ongoing healing.

And the boy the mother was praying over playing cards with my son. He had additional skin grafts this week and they are taking well. I am hopeful he will run and jump again someday. 

I am losing track of all the prayers for mercy and healing I have seen answered around here.