Fast Times at the Japanese Hospital

A large chunk of our time here in Granada is spent at the Japanese hospital. This is the large public hospital on the outskirts of town. It gets its name, not because it serves only specific asian tourists, but because it was built about 10 years ago with Japanese support.

We spend two mornings a week visiting with patients and helping nurses. We have taken vital signs, organized a mess of old x-rays, and set up a much needed system for incoming patients' paperwork. However we spend most of our time getting to know long term patients and their families. We talk with them (julie has had the spanish words 'infection', 'cleaning', 'antibiotic', and "getting better little by little" pounded into her head, pray with them, and even sing with them (we don't know too awful many well known spanish language songs, so "la bamba" was busted out quickly).

We spend our time in the surgery inpatient and infection ward. Patients are stuck in these rooms with 8 beds anywhere from 2 days to 3 months and counting. It's a pretty tough place to be for the patients and has absolutely shocked us from our standard view of hospitals in the USA. Everything is free for the patients, which is nice, however some days they do not have medicine, some days they do. The doctors (as in the entire hospital's legion of doctors) take vacation days very often. They will schedule a surgery for a date two weeks away, only to change it at the last minute for no reason, then change it again because there is not enough blood for the surgery. Many of the patients are there with a fairly simple infection, just waiting with no exact end date, just trying to keep up hope. The open-air rooms also hover at 80-90 degrees throughout the day and night. Despite the dismal description, there are many amazing people there and the relationships we have formed and the opportunities we've had have taught us invaluable lessons about our God,the Healer, spreading joy, and true patience.

Im afraid this blog would be entirely too long if I tried to go into details about all the folks we've met, and the experiences. Instead, we will post pictures and introduce you to a few of the pacientes.

Love yall!
Jose y Julia