Our mission as Afghan Army medical mentors is to train and advise our counterparts, and enabling them to become a competent, motivated, self-sustaining army. Sounds noble in theory, but it is a slow and often frustrating process. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy my mentoring job, but I sometimes feel like I'm talking to school children. Numerous times have I found myself nagging the medical staff about cleaning hospital bed sheets, putting needles in the sharps containers, or not giving antibiotics for every runny nose. Certain things I can let go, but when I discovered the condition of their medical supply closet...they had crossed the line!
Ayub and A1C Torres clearing shelvesWe're scheduled to have an inspection team arrive on the 15th of January, this inspection will provide a "report card" as to how well the ANA clinic will be able to function without US mentoring. One of the biggest threats to their success is their hodgepodge organizational techniques. My persistent pleading to reorganize their supply room (which looked like it was hit by a tornado) was met with a shrug of the soldiers and an offer for a glass of chai. Well, today I had no choice. Action was the only option so I brought my medical team into the clinic, and we started the reorganization project for them...virtually from scratch.
An organized mess!
In the picture above, we laid out the medical supplies from the supply closet, inventoried the items, and restocked their emergency room with supplies from the closet.
For now, we at least sorted the equipment into reasonable categories. We no longer had ortho splints and foley caths mingling together, nor did we have unopened needles and syringes scattered all over the place. You can see phase 1 of our close reorganization project above. Stay tuned for phase 2...
