Volunteer Ventilators

I am absent today in my duty. I have a flu. I feel so weak today but I still went online because I can not sleep with the kind of weather we have here in our country ((very, very H-O-T!)) plus the noise due to the on-going renovation of our house.

I texted Mitchie ((my co-volunteer)) and asked her how they're doing. I found out that only she and Diane are present. The other four members of our group, including me, are absent. Like me, they are also not feeling well.

She told me that they are already tired and busy ventilating this certain patient who was abandoned by his/her family. I feel so sorry for them. I apologized for not showing up. I could have helped them.

Let me tell you about the Medicine Ward, where we are currently assigned since last week. It is divided into three categories, the dirty (where all the pneumonia, tuberculosis and other air-borne diseases are), clean (any disease that aren't required to wear a mask for protection) and the "ICU". Yes, ICU with quotation marks.

Supposedly, an ICU should be well-ventilated. All of the ICUs I have been to are air-conditioned. But in this hospital, it is not. Actually, there is a real ICU which is air-conditioned but I bet it's for the patients who can afford to pay for the hospital services. I am not sure about that yet. Anyway, the ICU ward ((let's call it ICU ward so you won't be confused)) is just ventilated by two electric fans which is soooo dirty and rusty. A real ICU should have a cardiac monitor, infusion pumps and mechanical ventilator. In the ICU ward, I only saw one infusion pump which is understandable. But you know what's saddening? They don't have mechanical ventilators in it.

What is a mechanical ventilator? It's a machine that assists a patient to breathe 24/7. So how do those patients breathe spontaneously without a mechanical ventilator? They are ventilated by their relatives/guardians/family manually by an ambubag. Sad, right? Imagine a person pressing an ambubag 24/7. Who wouldn't get tired?

I pity the patients as well as their relatives. All of them are sleep deprived. They also have shifts like us, nurses. But what can they do? They don't have the money to pay for the real ICU. We can't blame the hospital too because they don't have enough equipment that they need due to lack of funds allotted by the government.

I wonder how our CORRUPT politicians can take this reality. Are they even aware what these patients are going through? I'm so disappointed that they still have the guts to corrupt while there are patients who can not receive the kind of health care that they deserve.

Well, reality really sucks.

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