Right to Sight

When it comes to work, its rare to have projects that land in your lap. I could spend weeks even months without a project in my view and suddenly BAM!, someone turns to you, poor little volunteer, and simply says, "I need your help." This happened to be the case two weeks ago when American eye doctors with the organization Right to Sight and Health came down to Kedougou with the goals of giving free eye consultations and cataract operations to the natives of our region.

An annual project which started a fews years ago, has proven, unlike other aid projects, has proven quite successful. Globally and locally here in Kedougou, this group of doctors have given the gift of sight to the blind and education and a way to "healthier sight."

Being a newcomer to Senegal, this was my first year working with this brilliant group. Being trained in local languages and living amongst the villagers makes us as Peace Corps qualified in the cultural respect aiding the doctors in what cultural barriere they may have to cross in working with the community.

As a health volunteer, I immediately jumped on this project. Knowing that the little Pulaar I've retained wouldn't exactly help the cause, I pressed for other angles they may need assistance with. "Well, we do need two volunteers to serve as physician's assistants in the operating room." Umm...yes please!

People who pursue the career as a physician's assistant in the western world attend school and undergo an extensive program and rotations for the ability to recieve the diploma of professional achievement. Lucky for me, Africa doesn't have malpractice laws, so I was handed this golden degree in a matter of two hours.

For two weeks, 9 hours a day,wrapped in a gown, latex gloves and a pretty flowered cap, I sterilized operating instruments, dressed the surgeons, prepared the sterile station and whatever else the surgeons needed. As the hours and days passed and I watched as cataract after cataract was ejected from eye after eye, I became completely infatuated with the work and managed by the end of the two weeks to have the whole operation memorized like the back of my hand. Of course, being in a Senegalese hospital...we did run into problems.

For example, the first day I felt like a complete idiot when I managed to drop a whole bucket of water in the operation room. Trudging around trying to clean up my accident in the operating room now a swamp, I thought they might fire me. However, they praised me for actually cleaning it up.

Also, the operating room we used was shared with the gynocologists. Needless to say, several surgeries were interrupted due to emergency C-sections that needed to be done. So, we would clear out and the operating room would turn into the labor and delivery ward. AFter a mere two hour delay, we would rotate yet again, resterilize the room and it would turn into an opthamalogist operating room. Needless, to say, not only did I get to witness eye surgery, but I watched three C-sections.

Working with surgeons is not an easy task. My hats off to those that do. I can't how many times I got yelled at for nearly contaminating the sterile station, forgetting to press the start button on the sterilizer and dropping the lens on the floor. I promise, I got better. You know those first few days of learning are the toughest. I laughed at myself...visualizing what I must look like....surgical mask, gloves, flip-flops, dirty feet and a threadbare skirt. Not your everyday nurse showing up for a day at work.

But I guess that is what my life is like....it's not your normal day at work...everyday is different.

All in all, over the course of two weeks, we completed over a hundred cataract operations. One case especially, a sixteen year old girl, who cried the whole time "NO Mussi" (in Pulaar means, "It hurts") was completely blind in both eyes. Today, she can see the streets she walks down in Kedougou. NO Mussi no more, my dear.