Saturday Nights All Right for Fighting

While these families were enjoying another beautiful day here on North Beach, immediately next to Westport, I unfortunately was on weekend call. I actually had been looking forward to finding out what call was like, but having to work when the weather is absolutely perfect is always hard.

And though I was thoroughly beaten up last time I attempted to learn to surf, I am always tempted again when I see other people attempting. The call was pretty interesting and quite varied. We take care of a small number of hospital inpatients who at this point are all quite old and often need somewhat extended stays in the hospital due to their age and frailty. In the US we would likely need to discharge them to some long term care but those resources here are pretty maxed out. I treated a couple kids with fractures. I was called in at 4 AM to sew up a badly beaten teen who was bitten in the face. I think he might have taken on Tyson but it was his lip rather than his ear. Sunday was relatively quiet after that with only a few patients seen in the emergency room I never really got to wear my cape, or helmet or turn on my flashing green light!

Sort of reminds you of Erik Estrada in CHIPS doesn't it?

Monday, after I returned the call car I had the Morning Off. Happily I bought a bike and that Evening Carolyn and I took a ride on near-by Utopia Road, which is quite pastoral and a beautiful little road to ride on.

I know this one reminds you of Erik Estrada in CHIPS

Actually at Work

Well, here's a post for those medical readers who have been wanting some info on actually working here.

Carolyn and I alternate our time between having scheduled appointments and being on the Duty Team. The scheduled appointments are what you might expect, people are given a 15 minute appointment slot to discuss their acute or chronic conditions. The duty rooster involves seeing acute patients but also patients who are not able to get to see a provider with appointments. At our clinic there are two MDs and usually 2 Nurses who are seeing duty patients.

We have found that our average daily visit numbers are very similar to what I have seen at Clinica and Carolyn at Indian Peaks. The differences reflect the support staff. Here, the front desk will check in the patient but I personally call the patient to my exam room, personally take whatever vital signs I deem important ( vital signs are vital, PSSHAW, not for knee pain!), personally review their medications, etc. So much of what we rely on in the States before we see the patient is up to us.

Overall though, the mix of patients has been great, the people have been friendly, We have seen traumatic amputations, sore throats, chronic mental illness,and gyn problems. The medicine is much the same as what we are used to in our Colorado practices, though I personally have yet to see the problems presented by the chronically homeless that we see at home. Also, though I keep ordering A1cs here expecting the typical diabetic or prediabetic result that I see at home, apparently the New Zealanders have not succeeded in matching our soda and sugar intake to make those tests so consistently abnormal.

We wanted to write this entry before our impressions were colored by our first weekend call experience. You might know, unlike the states, when we are on call here we get not only the on-call beeper but the on-call car, complete with a hard hat, flashing lights, emergency cape and all sorts of things to respond to emergencies. We cover the only ED within 100 KMs, cover the hospital ward, and cover the long term care wards. Transfers out of here have to go by helicopter. Obviously, this is not exactly how it works in Boulder Colorado when you can not have dinner at Mateos without bumping into three other MDs, every major intersection has a hospital with an MRI. So wish us well. I hope our post call post is as enthusiastic.

Punakaiki and Charming Creek Walks

You might get the impression that all we do is vacation here but that is not completely true. We finished with some of our orientation this past week by driving the beautiful coastal road down To Greymouth, which is our primary referral hospital for those not needing tertiary care. I was great to meet some of the staff there but most importantly to have a clear idea of what transferring a patient along this coastal road of 100 KM actually entails. It is nothing like shooting down I 70 in the states. First of all you do not see these signs along the way.

The coastal road was beautiful and on the way back we had the chance to do The Porarari/ Punakaiki Loop Track, an outstanding 3 hour wlk along one beautiful river gorge, over a ridge and down another.

Yesterday we were favored again with a beautiful morning, It being Saturday we drove a bit North to the Charming Creek Walk, another river gorge along the Ngakawau river turning up Charming creek. The walk follows an old private railroad bed used in the last century for mining and timber. It passes some pretty spectacular waterfalls,and has a nice suspension bridge crossing of the river.

This coming week we are fortunate to have a full week in the clinic before my first weekend of call. Now that we have a bit of a handle on the computer system and the health care network, things should go fine, after all the health conditions and practice are the same as we are used to. But since it is a sunny Sunday, we are off to a coastal walk and perhaps hear some folk music at the Drifter's cafe in Granity.

Snodgrass Road

We've been in Westport for four days now and feel fairly settled in.  Work this week consists of orientation, and is quite straightforward;  we have even been able to leave a bit early.  Out of the four days in our new town, we have had 2 1/2 days of heavy rain --- so much that Eric feels he's seen more rain in these last few days than in the whole previous year in Colorado.  This evening the rain let up, and we took a stroll down our rural little lane, with the unfortunate name of Snodgrass.  We are only 1 mile out of town, but on the other side of the Orowaiti River,  It's very rural, and we had fun meeting the local animals, wild and not-so-wild.
You know you are in New Zealand when you have sheep across the road. The bird life on the estuary side of the road is very rich, the photo above is a Pied Stilt and we have seen herons, oyster catchers and western Wekas.

Westport

After a sunny morning stroll along the Island Bay waterfront with Linda we caught a flight from Wellington to Westport. Unfortunately we got nailed with a huge fee for our second bags, be really careful if you fly domestic flights here. We had a smooth flight and had our first view of the South Island West coast from

Westport was one of the smallest airports we have flown into though the welcome was great and the staff from the clinic who met us were wonderful. They gave us a brief tour of the town and then took us to our home, a second unit on a property on the banks of the estuary in town.

We had a wonderful meal at a local pub last night where we were overwhelmed by the hospitality of the local folks. We greatly look forward to getting to know them. Today we will do some more settling into our home and perhaps check out the rec center. Still a bit to get done before we start work tomorrow.

Arrived!

After a very long but uneventful flight from Denver to Wellington via San Francisco and Auckland, we finally arrived in gale force winds to the Land Of Middle Earth. Look who was there to great us at the Wellington airport:

Then Mark and Linda Baxter took us on a quick driving tour of the city, passing by the theater that hosted the World Premier of The Hobbit:

and ending with a beautiful overlook of Wellington, despite the winds from the Cook Strait:

And though we have yet to see a Hobbit, We did get a chance to catch these Trolls at the museum

Tonight we are looking forward to our first New Zealand Leg of lamb of which I hope there will be many. Tomorrow we interview with the Medical board to finish the licensure process. Be seeing you, Carolyn and Eric