Monday's Happenings

Today we started early and visited examples of the Ghana Health Care System (they call it the Ghana Health Care "scheme" interestingly enough. We went to Ankaful Psychiatric Hospital and Ankaful Leprosy Hospital as well as the Central District Hospital (very large and much nicer...has an ICU and everything...of course the pumps don't work, etc.). There still is some leprosy in Africa and we saw a few males in the male ward missing various parts of their feet...it apparently strikes there first. Leprosy has some neuropathy so those afflicted don't feel when they get wounds on their feet and the disease progresses from there. It's sad.
The Psychiatric Hospital was also interesting. It has a very large grounds area and then the male ward or female wards. Lots of the grounds are for housing for the workers. The male ward was a very large open area in the center with "housing" around the open area. There were 97 male residents. The most common diagnosis was cannibus related psychosis. The males were grabbing and touching as we walked through...it was HOT and there were all 97 very close to us. They have 2 workers and no real security that we could see. The female ward was much quieter and more in control, but you could see a couple of schizophrenics walking about, talking to the voices, etc. The treatment was mostly medication...and the male nurse in the male ward said some residents had been there for years, while others are in and out in a few weeks.
Finally, the very large District Hospital was pretty well staffed from what we could see. This had an ICU, a peds, OB, surgery center, medical and surgical wards, etc. It had some but certainly not all of the equipment, meds etc that we are used to...overall though it wasn't too bad.

After all this, we ate at a lovely beach resort, Oasis Beach Resort where we watched drummer and dancers do their thing...very entertaining!