1 Nov 2023
I stood up from the stool in the ultrasound room and faced the family. The surgeon didn’t really need the ultrasound to confirm what we already knew—this tumor was too advanced. For two years this man had sought care in other hospitals and ...
Staci Davenport
Posted on June 23rd, 2024
9 Oct 23
Stories and parables from the Bible come to life much more readily when you study them with friends who have lived their whole lives in an agriculture-based society, with honor-shame values, where wealth can be measured in livestock and time ...
Staci Davenport
Posted on June 23rd, 2024
21 Dec 23
I sat sideways on the bench in the shade of the little restaurant at the bus stop, one foot illuminated by the beam of warm morning sunlight, enjoying the reprieve of the shade after the chill of the motorcycle ride which had finally given w...
Staci Davenport
Posted on June 23rd, 2024
2 Aug 2023
I flipped through the little portable health record booklet, or carnet, that the nursing student had just handed me for the patient who had just walked into the delivery room and was lying quietly on her side on a delivery table. I read the...
Staci Davenport
Posted on September 20th, 2023
12 Jul 2023
No, American friends, it’s not what you think. Caca is just an endearing Nangjere word for grandma (though all the Nangjere ladies giggle when I use the term, but not for the same reasons a five-year-old child or a five-year-old-at-heart a...
Staci Davenport
Posted on September 20th, 2023
18 May 2023
"Bonjour, Doctor, we have a woman here who has been waiting for her repeat cesarean section, and now she’s having contractions. She wanted to know at 4 am why we weren’t already calling the doctor at the first sign of low back pain because...
Staci Davenport
Posted on May 18th, 2023
29 Apr 2023
"He was playing in the house and something fell in his eye," the father explained. The patient’s older sister stood by, looking a little sheepish and guilty. Maybe she felt responsible since they were playing together. Maybe just an oldest...
Staci Davenport
Posted on May 18th, 2023
18 Apr 2023
I decided to write this for myself, to remember what I’m doing here, just in case I’m forgetting. You can follow along with my conversation with myself if you want.
I already had reasons before residency. I knew in medical school, in coll...
Staci Davenport
Posted on May 18th, 2023
22 Jan 23
As is so often the case here, the scars showed the location of the patient’s pain before he said anything. All over the 6 year old’s swollen abdomen, small groups of a few linear marks cut parallel to each other showed that traditional trea...
Staci Davenport
Posted on April 18th, 2023
17 Dec 2022
The buzzing phone dragged me back to consciousness. I noticed the Lock Screen blaring "hospital" in the darkness. Awareness came gradually. I noticed my sore throat, congestion, and general fuzziness. So much for sleeping off this cold/flu ...
Staci Davenport
Posted on December 28th, 2022
