The SIL Clinic

The SIL Clinic provides services for the residents of Ukarumpa and also serves as an aid post for Papua New Guineans living in the surrounding area. There are 3 doctors and 9 nurses who work at the clinic. The clinic also has a dental department. Heidi has been working steady at the clinic for almost6 weeks now. She is still on a steep learning curve, but has an excellent mentor who is a great teacher. Heidi has much more responsibility here than she did in Canada and works closely with the doctors. She is doing lab work and X-rays. The main responsibilities of the nurses at the clinic include screening patients for the doctors in the office, seeing their own patients (functioning more like a nurse practitioner would back home), and occasionally helping out in the Outpatient Department (OPD), where Papua NewGuinean patients are seen. The OPD side of the clinic sees an average of 100 patients per day! The clinic also serves some of the surrounding villages by holding Community Health Clinics; the nurses go out to villages and give vaccinations to the babies and children. The clinic is only openduring the day so the nurses and doctors take turns being on-call during the night and on weekends. Heidi has been on-call a few times during theholidays and for several evenings/weekends. Paul has been helping the clinic by volunteering as a driver for the on-call nurses. If the nurse on-call needs to go to the clinic during the night a driver picks her up and waits at the clinic until the appointment is finished. So far he hasn’t been busy.