​… And then there were eight. Dr. Kerner and her plastics crew left for the airport this morning. Leaving us with a bit of a skeleton crew for the final stretch. We were all sad to see them go. 

​One last group shot with Dr. Kerner and her team. Left to right: Sue, Lance, Lorna, Sean, Megan, Dr. Kerner, Dr. St. Clair, Jordan, Bogden, Alvina and Michelle.
 
We started the operative day with a 12-year-old girl, Sheila, with congenital scoliosis. We instrumented her spine from T3-T12 and Dr. St. Clair performed some corrective maneuvers to get her spine into a more normal alignment.
 

​Our third case was an L3 – L5 decompression and fusion in a lady with back and leg pain.
 
 
Several of our patients presented with lower extremity weakness that persisted despite our interventions. We worked with local suppliers to acquire wheelchairs for these patients to assist with mobility, and many have begun to become accustomed to using a wheelchair around the hospital grounds. Michelle and Jordan even enlisted some of the youngsters nearby (who were eager to help) in the wheelchair training process.

​And succeed we will.
 
We’ve all got a case of the Mondays after a long week and a busy – but fun – weekend. We put that all aside, though, to focus on finishing strong in this last week of the mission.
 
Our surgical case du jour is a young man named David with congenital scoliosis. We corrected his deformity as much as was safe, and fused him into his corrected position. Having never witnessed much pediatric scoliosis surgery at my home institution, I must say it is striking to see the degree of correction achievable. To see the shape of a patient’s spine altered so drastically is something to behold. What is most remarkable is that the majority of the correction occurs in the last few minutes of surgery. Hours are spent exposing and placing pedicle screws, and then just before the surgery is over and closing begins, a few rods are bent just so, the spine is moved here and there, and suddenly – and somewhat miraculously - the patient’s spine looks almost normal, when just minutes before it looked a bit of a mess. 

We planned to have several other surgeries today, but they were cancelled for various reasons. Instead, we spent the rest of the day in the penalty box, seeing something like 30 patients and lining up add-on cases for the rest of the week.
 
Sue: “Have you been outside? There must be 30 people out there in line holding x-rays!”
 
Such is the nature of clinic. It pops up sometimes without warning, and when it rains, it often pours. We did our due diligence and made sure everyone was seen. Many of the patients we saw needed anti-inflammatories and physiotherapy rather than surgery, but we did find one or two patients that were added on to the OR schedule later in the week.

​Jordan didn’t have any lollipops handy, so she rummaged through her backpack and found a pack of stickers. She must’ve stuck 7 or more stickers on this little girl’s face and hands.