July 5th – July 6th Clinic in the Capital

Returning to Apia, I was pleased to see that the Byrd was pier
side. This would make it much easier to get on and off the ship. We got back on board with just enough time to shower and grab some food before we left again to set up clinic in Apia. The site chosen for the clinic was a large community center near the center of town. The main part of the building was a massive open room with a stage in one corner and a kitchen in another. With Apia being the capital as well as the most populated city in Samoa, we were expecting to see larger numbers than what we encountered in Sataua. However, I was still shocked to see just how many chairs had been set up in the waiting areas. It was a sea of plastic. Hundreds of chairs…we were going to be busy.

The building's kitchen opened up to the main room through a series of windows that could slide to one side to allow for the serving of food. It seemed the natural choice for the pharmacy location with one exception: It was overrun with ants and cockroaches. A call went out to the Navy's preventative medicine team and they responded with a backpack sprayer of permethrin. I have to admit, I was a bit skeptical at first. After all, permethrin is what we use on little kids to kill lice. I expected to return the next day to find a room full of angry cockroaches, alive and ready to fight. Thankfully these bugs capitulated to the chemicals and I returned the next day to find massive cockroach casualties.

With the roach problem behind me, my focus returned to how to deal this onslaught of patients that had been predicted. In Sataua, John Nett and I were alone and making it up as we went along. Here in Apia, we had help from a Navy pharmacy tech and series of lessons learned from our experience in Sataua. Before long we had the pharmacy organized and a workflow established. We saw 180 patients the first day and filled 270 prescriptions. We were busy, but it was smooth sailing all day. Never did I feel rushed or overwhelmed.