What happened to September?

It is amazing to me that it is already October – it seems that Sept. just started. But then again, when I think back on it, there's been enough happening to fill a month...and I've even had renewed energy to do it since monsoon is on its way out. A friend put it well - it's “a bit like slowly waking up after being unwell for a while - suddenly realising that you can think a bit more clearly and have some energy again.” It's great to be at that point.

The month started with a visit from 4 friends from Toronto Rehab's NepalAbility group. I had met them all before coming, and it was a treat to see them again here. They were doing a week of teaching about Spinal Cord Injury at Green Pastures Hospital. This went quite well – we even had a young patient who had good English join us for the sessions. Their arrival was timed with the mountains appearing again for the first time in months - I had renewed awe at their splendor after months without them. They were staying at a hotel down at Lakeside that you reach by taking a boat across – and they invited Sita and I to come out and join them for swimming and a very nice dinner on their last night in town.

The group then went on to do a week of teaching at Tansen Mission Hospital, a general hospital in a small town in the hills about 4 hours drive from here. I took some holiday and went along too – to get to spend some more time with them, and also to get to see a place I'd not seen yet. It was an exciting drive up the windy roads, with breathtaking scenery, and then we got to stay in the very nice hospital guest house. From the guest house, it was about a 20 min walk up to the top of the hill, where you could get a fabulous view of the valley below, as well as sunset or sunrise. We all went on a couple of home visits, trekking down into the valley to visit a paraplegic and stroke affected patient.

I headed back to Pokhara later in the week – and since I was heading that way anyway, did a recommended hike down from Tansen to the main road below. The morning was misty, so I didn't get some of the views we'd had in previous days, but was beautiful in its own way, and cleared as I got lower. I was on my own, and so 'went by asking' – a Nepali expression that is typical of how one gets anywhere once you're off the main roads – at every intersection you ask someone which way to go. It took me three hours to get to the point in the road that takes an hour by car, as the trekking route is considerably more direct (ie steeply downhill!). I've posted pictures with comments about the whole NepalAblity visit here.

I got back to Pokhara, knowing I needed to get cracking on my follow-up project on the spinal cord injury (SCI) patients from the hospital. My initial plan of evaluating patient wheelchairs has grown to a general assessment of how SCI patients fare once discharged – looking at health, housing, wheelchairs, work opportunities etc. Over the summer I had managed to go through the medical charts, and more or less summarize what I needed. Now I had the patient list from 2007, I needed to finalize the questionnaires, and track down where the patients actually lived (and if they were still living).

I went to talk to the Community Based Rehabilitation organization that is associated with the hospital, and that provides follow up support for some patients (like house adaptations and providing training for new job skills). They were very helpful, and suggested that I could join one of their workers in the field in a week's time, to visit the patients in that area. This was great news for me, as they already have relationships with some of our discharged patients, and are skilled at locating people out in rural areas. It was also stressful news, as I needed to be ready to go a week from then. Yikes.

Getting organized to head out for patient visits filled up much of the rest of September. It was a bit touch and go if I would be ready in time, but in the end I was, and had a successful 4 days out in rural Nepal doing home visits. But that's another blog entry...and with some holidays coming up, I hope to be able to post about it in the next week.