Prime
A day in the life of a Clinical Officer: Never too busy for an emergency
My alarm goes off at 5am. The first thing I do is pray. Thereafter, I go through my E-mails then do some research on the internet and read other reference books to look up treatment options. I also call up my friends to find out how they are, after which I call the night duty nurse to ascertain the patient inflow during the night. I leave home by 7.45am.
On reaching the clinic, I review the patients from the previous day. It is only in emergency situations that I attend to those who come in later. In most cases, I’m done with the patients review at around 10am.
I always take a glass of juice as I relax my mind and do more research. My lunch break is one hour. I resume work at 2pm. Because the patients in flow is a bit low in the afternoon, I use that time to make follow-ups on patients mostly those who were discharged. I sometimes receive emergencies like motor or boda boda accidents cases, serious burns among others. I start seeing children with different health issues from 5pm to 7pm though sometimes work later if the patient in flow is high. I normally meet my friends to have a cup of coffee and chat about different things.
It becomes challenging when some patients fail to explain their illness. With this they end up getting treatment that is not appropriate. Also those patients that delay to clear the treatment balances as agreed and I end up injecting my own money to purchase other requirements because I have to keep the clinic running.
I’m planning to see that Kuteesa General Clinic becomes a bigger health facility (in our catchment area) through lobbying for the establishment of state-of-the-art medical equipment in the laboratory and imaging department. I would like to establish a big hospital in Butaleja, my home district so that I bring services near to the people. In that way, I will be reducing on the high death rate. I’m also planning to set up an NGO that will aim at training people about health issues.
-Jonathan Kabasa, Medical clinical officer, Kuteesa General Clinic
