Week 2: Travel to Western Uganda

This week has been spent travelling with Edward to visit students at their places of work. The map below shows roughly where we have been. Mukono-Mityana-Fort Portal-Kasese-Kabale-Masaka-Mukono

 

The days have included long drives to get to the students, some of the roads are typical of those in Canada but many are considered roads where “only the drunk drive straight”. There are so many potholes, many large enough to be bathtubs, that drivers are constantly swerving all over the road to try and avoid as many as possible. It is a little unnerving at first to see drivers barreling toward you zigzagging in and out of their lane. Other roads are not even paved so they are dusty, or muddy if it has been raining, and have been worn down by vehicles making them a very bumpy ride!

Here is a road we took to visit a Rural health center near Masaka after it had been raining so the road was very muddy

This is what a typical main road in a small town will look like, this is in Mityana

 

The scenery on the drives has been amazing, Uganda has such fertile land that there is just green everywhere. On Tuesday we drove through Queen Elizabeth National Park which a large national park where many safaris operate. Upon entering the park we crossed over the equator, being the tourist that we are we stopped to take picture of the signs marking the border. When we got out of the car Edward heard rustling and noise from the bushes on the other side of the road, this turned out to be a small elephant. We decided to abandon the equator sign as we would have another opportunity later and instead look pictures of the elephant from the safety of the car. Driving through the rest of the park we got to see some buffalo, a large pack of elephants, and kob. These were all a ways in the distance so we did not stop to try and take pictures.

Gorgeous landscape outside of Fort Portal towards the Congo border

 

Elephant near the Equator in Queen Elizabeth National Park

Classic tourist picture that is a requirement if travelling to Uganda

View of the Rift Valley which is where Queen Elizabeth National Park is located 

When we actually visit the students we meet with their supervisors if they are present and get a tour of the facility. Edward is very good at talking with the other workers of the facility to learn what struggles they face and what they are excelling at. This gives Edward an idea of the conditions in which the students work. Once toured around Edward meets with the student to go over their projects to see how they are coming along and to offer assistance.  Seeing all the various facilities has really opened by eyes to the reality of health care in this country. We visited various district hospitals which are main hospitals for the region, referral hospitals where patients from other facilities will be brought, and health clinics which serve smaller regions and are much more basic. At all of the facilities there was one prominent problem, they are overwhelmingly understaffed and the staff that are present are being over worked. One hospital has a recommended ratio of 1 nurse to 5 patients in a typical ward however the nurses told us it was consistently a ratio of 1 nurse to 20 or 30 patients. Another facility is designed to optimally run with 37 doctors but there are only a mere 7 at the hospital, one of which doesn’t even see patients as they are the head administrator. The health clinic we visited considered themselves fortunate because they actually had a doctor, even though he is not there on a regular basis. At this health center they had nurse assistants independently treating and diagnosing patients when in reality they lack the training to do so. Edward has explained that these problem are due to the low salary for health professionals in Uganda, many people once completing their training look for work in neighbouring countries where the pay can be up to 10x higher or they look to relocate to Europe and North America.

The Staff "toilet" at the Mityana District Hospital

The hospital outside Fort Portal had its roof blown off so patients have been staying in these UNICEF tents since November

Facilities at the health clinic outside of Masaka

Edward, his student, and I outside of the health clinic near Masaka 

One of the best things while travelling around has been to see is the happiness on the children’s face’s when we drive past and they realize a “Muzungu” or white person is in the car. They all wave frantically yelling Hi or Bye Muzungu and are just so excited to see white people. It is amazing the difference in culture with children here vs. North America. The children here are what looks to be 4 or 5 years old and they are walking independently on the side of the road to their schools or to collect water. Once school is over the children are out playing or helping their families until it is dark instead of sitting in front of televisions and computer screen. It really is refreshing to see.

After a busy week we are taking the weekend to relax a little bit as we now have working Wi-Fi in our guesthouse!! It is pathetic how happy this has made us, but it means we no longer need to walk down to the library to get Internet access.

Hope everyone reading this is doing well and having exciting adventures of their own!

Jess

P.S. If you guys have any suggestions of how to make this blog better (more post, more pictures, less words etc.) let me know in the comments!