My Pink Splint

Part of an OT's role is to make splints for various kinds of conditions. A splint, in a nutshell, is usually a plastic tailor made device that holds a part of the body in a particular position. At varsity we are trained to make these devices for hand conditions primarily. As with most teachings, at varsity you can only have so much practical training and most of your clinical experience takes place in the working environment. Here is one such learning moment:

Early in my community service I found myself alone in the department one afternoon. A patient came in with a peripheral nerve injury of the hand and desperately needed a resting splint. It is always helpful to have someone around to assist you when you are an inexperienced splinter but this afternoon I was alone and had no choice but to make the splint by myself. The only material we had available was pink perforated Aquaplast. This kind of material is usually used for children with small arms or finger splints but I had no choice... I had to use it.

The material was HORRIFIC it stretched beyond recognition and the webspace ended half way up my patient's arm. As I think about it now I'm not sure why the splint even had a webspace... It looked like a dog had it for breakfast. That splint became infamous in the OT department. Each time my patient came for a follow up appointment, the staff couldn't contain their laughter.

Did I mind? Not in the least! My patient, a sweet old man, treasured his pink splint. He wore it all the time because it kept his limb in a neutral position. If it was an exam I would have failed on the aesthetically pleasing part but I got an A-plus for client satisfaction. And in my eyes that's the most important part...

That's all.

Why it Was Cool Being a Kid of the 80's and 90's

• Fashion was funky, at the age of four, I had acid washed jeans, Doc Martins and a perm style hairdo (100% natural of course).
• The cartoons produced then were top class, who doesn't remember Gummy Bears, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and The Smurfs.
• I missed the era of apartheid but remember the first elections.
• Michael Jackson (RIP) had a concert in Cape Town and I attended! (U2 is awesome live I'm sure but, in my opinion, MJ will always be the best entertainer, Sorry U2 fans).
• Music was fun, they simply don't make songs like Macarena, Barbie Girl and Too Sexy anymore.
• Parents had not realised the amount of unhealthy additives in those ridiculously bright sweets and mix-a-drink cooldrinks yet.
• As kids we used our imagination on a regular basis, we were not couch potatoes and it was safe to play outside until late into the evenings.
• Computars just started to become popular, even though they only had two colour screens, and games like Prince of Persia kept you entertained for hours.
• There were plenty of good programmes for little boys to watch such as, Knight Rider, The A-Team and Dallas ( I think only my brother watched Dallas though) and little boys had plenty of bad musicians to idolize, such as MC Hammer, Snow and Vanilla Ice.
• Fireworks weren't banned in residential areas as yet and Guy Fawkes and New Year's Eve were always memorable days on the calendar (as a supporter of animal rights I completely support the ban now but I have had my years of ignorant bliss).

That's all.

The Failed Magician

Its strange how siblings from the same parents can have such markedly different personalities. Since I was a young child I have always been an introvert by nature, my sister on the other hand was a born performer. Anyway, we were both given a chance to express our individuality.

The idea of performing in front of an audience petrified me but I thoroughly enjoyed putting on a show for my immediate family. Even if have to say so myself, I could do a mean Mr Bean impersonation and I was quite the impressive magician.

During one of my performances I magnificently executed my 'Cut the Doll in Half' act and left everyone, especially my little sister, astounded. She couldn't fathom how after putting a paper doll in an envelope and cutting it in half with a scissors, the doll was still left in one piece. She secretly decided she had to try this one out for herself...

As I entered my bedroom later that evening I found my doll laying on my bed with a handkerchief suspiciously placed across her waist. On closer inspection I found that my beloved doll had been cut in half and the handkerchief was strategically placed across her middle to conceal this.


As you can imagine I never left my sister alone with my magic set again.




That's all.

Running Out of Gas?

After 2 weeks of intensive blogging I seem to be slowing down...Could I have run out of random life experiences or have I just encountered bloggers' block? The truth is randomness is attracted to me, whether I like it or not, therefore I think it's the latter. I'm hopeful Ill remember old adventures and have many new adventures and you can rest assured those will be documented here.

Watch this space...

P. S. I have run out of gas in real life but who hasn't? Makes for a good story...

That's all.

Murphy's Law is Not So Sweet When

As a 40+kg therapist you get referred the morbidly obese stroke patient that can't sit up and you have to work with the physio with a bad back (NB: not all physios have bad backs, it is mainly the older, lazier ones).

This story has a happy ending though, a 40+kg speech therapist assisted me in getting the patient to sit up. Don't believe me? I still have the biceps to prove it.


That's all.

Murphy's Law is Sweet When

Your homework gets circulated around the Eerste Taal Afrikaans class. When the teacher calls on you to provide an answer your answer is correct. When the teacher calls on one of your classmates to provide an answer your answer is incorrect :-).

That's all.

Why Ill Always Love the North West Province

• Having come across my love for local house music here.
• Suncity.
• Evening walks in Kloof with a friend.
• Zanzibar (a dodgy club with the worst music and strangest patrons but the company was always good).
• Waking up and seeing a small buck outside my window.
• The sound of baboons jumping on my roof in the morning (at first I was afraid but eventually I found it rather comforting).
• The frequent good hair days (the air is so dry it keeps frizz prone hair tamer for longer).
• Amusing locals strange dress sense, choice of hair colour or backward way of thinking (some days I felt as if I was in movie, a movie set in America but prior to Martin Luther King's time).
• Tasting pap for the first time and liking it (pap tert is a real winner).
• Camping in the wilderness and choosing to sleep outside the tent.
• Huge ass baboon spiders taking residence on my pillow and forcing my roommate and I to laugh in the face of danger.
• Learning and enjoying Tswana culture and people.
• Mocktails at Piattos.
• My first game drive.
• Pick-a-pancake.
• Seeing the mountain, a few metres above my house, ablaze. 
• The most beautiful winter sunrises (this counts for much because I'm from Cape Town and I have seen my fair share of beauty).
• The incredible friends I made.

That's all.

Something That Goes Gurgle Gurgle in the Ward

When you work in a hospital setting, at one point or the other you are bound to come across death. It isn't ever a happy situation but my reaction and the reaction of those I work with can be amusing at times.


One day as I was finishing up with a patient in the ward I became aware that a patient across the room had passed away. Unfortunately death is common place in these wards and you have no choice but to go about your duties as normal. As I was writing the progress notes in my patient's file, the porter came in to collect the body to take to the morgue. The deceased patient's family however, was still at the body paying their respects, so the porter came to stand next to me while they finished.


As we stood waiting across the room we heard something that sounded like gurgling liquid coming from the direction of the covered body. Our eyes went as wide as saucers. The porter whispered to me that if that sound was coming from the body there was NO WAY he was taking it! We both listened as the gurgling continued and continued. Just as the porter was about to make a run for it, (I, myself was scared senseless but  my inquisitive nature got the better of me) one of the bereaved family members answered her cellphone and the noise stopped... The porter and I breathed a simultaneous sigh of relief and chuckled at our silliness...



That's all.

What to Do When You Are Bored in a Rehab Department

Before I begin, I must first demystify the myth that ALL government workers are lazy. The colleagues I associate myself with are some of the most hardworking individuals you will ever meet! This is some of the fun we have in our rare downtime:

• Do the weekly crossword in Move as a team building exercise.
• Make a pin up picture of McDreamy (with removable boxers...).
• Test drive the tilt table, electric wheelchair and any other form of equipment in the department with a motor.
• Sleep on the plinth.
• Go to physio for a massage.
• Have your hearing tested by the audiologists.
• Ask a handsome colleague to come down to the rehab department to show the ladies  what he is wearing, and said colleague agrees.
• Be a guinea pig for the audiologists new ABR machine (if you value your ear lobes I would not recommend this).
• Arrange the wheelchairs by size, only to realise you put the most common size in the least accessible place.
• Draw a line in the OT store room dividing it exactly in half, and throwing a hissyfit if any of the physios crutches crosses this line.
• Hang the most hideous life-sized doll from a window in the staff bathroom, and count how many staff members miss the bowl.
• Climb a tree on the hospital grounds because it will make a good photograph and get caught by the physio HOD. 
• Make a collection box for two poor OTs who would like to go to Australia and call it the Chadia Fund (this doesn't work well in a government hospital however, because patients are poor and doctors are stingy). 
• Prank call a dietitian pretending to be his supervisor.

That's all.

A Paediatric Specialist, but Not Really...

Much has been written about this strange doctor and I wouldn't be surprized if someone eventually writes a book about him one day. Here are a few memorable quotes:

• "Do you think I can put this photograph of this dying child on the cover of my book?"
• "So what exactly does an OT do?" (could be the 376th time he has asked this question)
• "Why do children have to play? Don't you think its just a waste of their time?"
• "All these babies don't have mothers and I need you to come in everyday and be their mother."
• "Can't you give the babies that cant walk yet tiny little walking frames?"
• "I have been to Cape Town. Why do men there call their girlfriends gooses?"

That's all

My Dog's Spoon

Background: As discussed previously, dog food isn't halaal. I used a specific spoon to dish up my dear dog's food and washed it separately .

Daughter: Mommy where is the dog's spoon?

Uncle: Eet julle hond dan met 'n lepel?! (loosely translated this means does your dog eat with a spoon)


That's all.

What Not to Name Your Baby

• Advice
• Guilty
• Nandos
• Buda
• Rainy
• Voice 

That's all.

Fruits from Your Ladder

This story isn't mine to tell, but until the protagonist writes her own blog, I will borrow it.

One quiet Friday afternoon the following conversation took place at a hospital in a small town in the North West Province:

OT: May I please borrow your step ladder?

Old, stern physio: Why do you need it?

OT: I am going to do a work related treatment session with a patient in Ward 12.

Old, stern physio: OK but look after it and be sure to bring it back to me as soon as you are done.

OT: OK

( 3 OTS ACTUALLY used the step ladder to go mulberry picking on the hospital premises)

Later...

Old, stern physio: How did your session go?

OT: Ummm... the activity was too difficult for my patient.



That's all.

Reasons Why I Love My Grandma

• She knits the best scarves.
• She SMSs me everytime a Jackie Chan movie comes on TV.
• She can SMS.
• She can Mxit.
• She went to the shop to RICA so she could get R5 free airtime.
• She doesn't watch Isidingo because she thinks Cherel is a witch and if she sees her in the street she will slap her.
• She reads the TV plus weekly to see what is going to happen in Isidingo.
• She told my father Sophia killed Braam, before the episode screened, and spoiled Isidingo for him.
• She is on a lifelong quest for the perfect handbag to take with her to hospital (for her TV plus and knitting needles of course).

Thats's all.

Some Orientation Early in the Morning

OT: Dumela bhuti. Do you understand English?

Male head injury patient: Yes

OT: My name is Nadine*. What is your name?

Male head injury patient: (Blank stare)

 OT: (Louder) My name is Nadine*. What is your name?

Male head injury patient: (Blank stare)

 OT: (Loudest) My name is Nadine*.What is your name?

Male head injury patient: My name is Candice.

(Speech therapist, observing in the background, snickers at OT's epic fail.)

*Name changed

That's all.

She Aint Heavy, She's My Baby

OT: Mama, why is your baby so overweight? She is really going to really struggle to crawl if she is so heavy.

Mama: I don't know. I don't feed her too much.

OT: When we are done here can you please go see the dietitian?

Mama: OK.

OT: Let's finish the assessment. Mama do you work?

Mama: Yes

OT: Where do you work?

Mama: KFC...  


That's all.

You Know You Are a Health Professional When...

• You have no problem sleeping with a box of human bones under your bed.
• You have run after a patient at least once.
• You have run from a doctor, who asks stupid questions, at least once.
• You have no problem discussing sepsis, gangrene, catheters and stomas at the lunch table.
• You find fainting in a ward round common place.
• You have been bitten at least once.
• You have a medical file at the hospital you work at.
• You have been the pseudo mother/father of at least one abandoned baby and you were left heartbroken when the baby was eventually discharged.

 That's all.

My Christian Dog

This post is dedicated to my sister who says I shouldn't give up my day job.

Little sister: Mommy what will happen if I eat dog food?

Mother: Nothing, but dog food isn't halaal.

Little sister: Do we have a Christian dog?!

That's all.

Black Lips

A conversation that took place in a Occupational Therapy Kitchen one day:

OT 1: Why are your lips so black? Did you eat some chocolate?

OT 2: No, maybe it's dust...

That's all...

Can I Be a Super Hero?

Not too long in the distant past, this conversation took place in my household:

Mother, to her 20-something-year-old son: “Are you sitting on the toilet with your doll?”

Son: “It’s not a doll, it’s an action figure!”

That’s all.

Lessons From a Rastafarian

• It is difficult to have a discussion with a Rastafarian patient, with schizophrenia, about the ill effects of marijuana on his illness.
• More importantly never, ever discuss marriage with said Rastafarian, as one unfortunate student learnt the hard way.

That’s all.

Was Lost but Now I'm Found

I must admit I have one very big flaw. I have no sense of direction or position in space at all! In my defense it is hereditary, my father has the same problem.

Let me describe a few occasions when I have lost myself:

• I misplaced myself in a shopping mall once. I tried to use the Post Office as a landmark but that didn't work out so well as I confused it with a Post Net. People had to literally send out a search party for me. 
• I attempted to show some friends, from out of town, where Access Park was. We ended up in Belville. All the free ways in Cape Town look the same ok!
• I lost my car in the airport parking lot once, for nearly an hour. I found it eventually on a level above me. Who would have guessed that all the parking levels look identical...
  

Thankfully and coincidentally, just as society agreed to let me on the road an assistive device became available to compensate for my impairment. It is called a global positioning system (a.k.a GPS). I only get lost 63.333% of the time now. "Keep left but stay in the right lane" gets me every time! It also doesn't help much in malls or parking lots. Stupid GPS!

That's all.

An Indian, but Not Really.

As I entered the psychiatric ward one day, a patient greeted me  by singing, at the top his lungs, "I'm an Indian, I'm a little Indian, I'm an Indian in New York...". I quite enjoyed his rendition of the popular Sting song, probably more so because I am not an Indian.

That's all.