First day at the Cancer Center

After a breakfast of jam and toast, I headed over to the Cancer Center. It's only a 5 minute walk from Vals, and they were open! I walked in and met the receptionist, Emily and a patient and her mother. Emily gave me a quick tour of the clinic and told me that Nurse Obi was running late because a friend of hers was in a car accident last night and she was checking up on him in the hospital. The clinic is very small. The reception area, two chemotherapy rooms that have big leather chairs and tvs, a back 'lab' where the drugs are mixed and meds are prepared, an examination room, a waiting room and the back office.
Before the nurse got there a small girl, age 3?, and a 5yo boy came in, both with their families and both with leukemia. The girl had a slight cough, but other than that seemed completely happy and healthy. The little boy appeared healthy and happy as well. Once the nurse came in, she immediately started the first woman on chemo, gave the little girl an injection (of what im not sure yet) and also hooked the little boy up to chemo. Both of the kiddos were troopers and hardly cried at all. Nurse Obi showed how things work in the back office and got me to look at the little boy's blood work (done at another location) and report back to her. His WBC (white blood cell) count had more than doubled and was now in the 'healthy' range. Very good news she said.
When noon rolled around, they told me that this week would be slow and that there would be no more patients today. Dr. Grant is coming in next week and they try to schedule most pt appointments when he is in town. So i better rest up for next week! Dr. Grant lives in LA and travels to Belize for a week each month and does all the consultations and first appointments, as well as assigns the treatment plans for each patient. I'm looking forward to meeting him!
They said I could go, but to come back at 9am tomorrow to get a better orientation with Emily so that I could be more helpful for the pts on wednesday! So I went to go find some street food (stew beans, rice and coconut milk and coleslaw- yumm) and now i'm back hanging out at vals!

oh and i realized after my last post that i was a week early with the father's day message... hope i didnt confuse anyone else! hahaha