July 6th – Following up with HBC Patients

According to my itinerary I was supposed to leave today to go to Kasungu today, but decided to stay an extra day. I had wanted to see the Home Based Care patients who were coming in today and I had heard that Father Kamela was going to Lilongwe on Tuesday so I could get a free ride.

So I went and did the morning rounds with Mr. Stima and Mr. Mshanga. By that time Mr. D Dyelatu had arrived, the patient who had been having three years of abdominal pains. In a weird way, I was particularly excited to see him because I would be able to see his stool and urine sample under a microscope. Again we were expecting either bilharzia or worms to be found in his stool.

Sure enough, we found LOTS of worm eggs in Mr. D stool sample and only white blood cells in the urine sample (see picture of stool sample). Based on the eggs seen in his stool the lab tech determined that Mr. D had Ascaris species of worms. There are a total of five different worms that can be found: Ascaris (Round worm), Pinworm, Hookworm, Tapeworm, and Whipworm. The majority of these worms are spread by feces-to-mouth transmission – meaning an infected person goes to the bathroom, forgets to wash his/her hands, then proceeds to use their infected hands for daily task (cooking, eating, shaking another’s hands). You can imagine how quickly these worms can spread. I only wonder how many people Mr. D infected during his three year infection.

After seeing to Mr. D treatment, I went with Brother Patrick who was studying under Father Kamela to the Catholic Mission garden. They have such a nice and well tended garden. The mission is located right on the Ludzi river, so they have access to water throughout the entire year. The surplus of the food first goes to feed the children at their orphanage and then they sell the rest and use the extra money to support the mission (hospital, primary school, etc.). They also fish ponds, raise goats, pigs, cattle, and chickens. The entire operation is self supporting.

Following my tour of the garden, Father Kamela took me to see the Kacebera Seminary School. This school is used to train the future Catholic priest. It sits, literally, on the Malawian-Zambian border. It was built back in the colonial days and is a very nice building. I don’t know how priest are able to commit their entire life to God.……

Then Father Kamela took me to see his family’s land near the seminary. His father was a Member of Parliament and is now retired. He has ten brothers and sisters. The entire family bought a plot of land near their home village, built a house, and now the retired parents live there and take care of the garden. When I arrived they were harvesting their latest maize crops. Also as we were waiting there were some older village women who started singing some welcome songs for me and even did some dances for me. There was one particular woman who looked like she was in her 50’s and only had one tooth – she kept smiling, dancing, and singing. Her laughter and happiness was infectious.

Following our visit to Father Kamela’s house we drove back to the mission for my last meal with the sisters.

This last meal was wonderful. The sisters gave me a big jar of ground nuts (peanuts), Malawi curios, and some Guava wine for my trip home. They told me that all of these gifts are for my wife because she couldn’t come. It was very nice of them to give me. In return, I had brought some of my Uncle Willie’s smoked and canned salmon for the Sisters. They absolutely loved the salmon.