Butare

The latter part of last week was spent at CHUB, or Butare’s University hospital. Smaller than CHUK (only 4 operating rooms), but a good place to teach. Mohamed and I had a great time teaching the three residents who are on rotation at that site. It seems the cases were a bit simpler, with orthopedics, general surgery, and OB/gyn being the bulk of the case load. The anesthesia techs and students were also very interested in learning while we were there. Mohamed even got to teach about and fashion his own cardboard L-device to hold the anesthetic circuit.

Best of all, we were able to do……..regional anesthesia! We had left the U/S in Kigali, but no worries, because we performed 3 blocks with the nerve stimulator, and a fascia iliaca block via loss of resistance, all of which were great. The residents and anesthesia techs were very interested in observing these techniques; it seems we had no less than 6 people observing placement of the blocks!  The patients were quite satisfied with their postoperative analgesia. Side note: it is amazing how much longer a nerve stimulator technique takes when we are so accustomed to ultrasound-guided techniques.

Another side note: on numerous occasions, we have been left without electricity either just prior to eating or during dinner. Either at home or restaurants, it doesn’t matter. electricity is not really the most dependable of utilities in Rwanda. So after it happened again in Butare we decided just to photographically memorialize the events or, how we have come to describe the experience, an ongoing bromance marked by candle-lit dinners. At the present time, however, our slow internet isn’t permitting picture uploads. To be added later.

After two days in Butare, we set off for Nyungwe National Park. I’ll let Mo talk about that in more detail, but it was a good relaxing time. Now we are back in Kigali, with one more week of work ahead of us!