A week ago I could hardly believe I could attend a woman in labour without at least some medical supplies. What about the linens we use in Canada, the blue pads which we throw out mindlessly, the fancy doppler we use to hear the heartbeat every 5 minutes when pushing? But today I caught one of a set of twins (a girl) using nothing more than two pairs of gloves on, some cotton (think of a roll of cotton balls), one needle and syringe with Oxytocin and a razor blade to cut the umbilical cords. Oh and a fabulous preceptor who when I said : 'Angela the placenta is right there, I know I feel it but it won't come' she simply replied 'oh that because its a bum not a placenta' --- right then--- and calmly delivered the breech (bum first) baby boy.
We used, as we do for every birth, the edges of our gloves to tie the umbilical cords and mom's cloths for drying the baby. Mom was fine, fed the babies minutes later was up eating and walking within 30 minutes. We gave her some donatedblankets, lovely hand knit sweaters and dolls which she seemed to love.
The sad side of not having access to any medical supplies is that of course there are more deaths here than we have in Canada and I don't want to downplay the significance of seeing babies wrapped in their mother's cloths after passing away. I don't wish for us to celebrate using nothing at the expense of mothers and babies but to simply say birth is normal and happens. With or without a doppler and blue pads.
No comments:
Post a Comment