iStat-tastic

Connie, Mary Kay, and Julie

On Thursday I went to the office of the pediatrician who is going to be going with me to Haiti.  She wanted to make sure that I knew how to use the "iStat".  Not developed by Apple, this nifty little device is going to enable us to check the blood of our Haitian patients.

It comes with cartridges that you put a little blood on.  Slide the cartridge into the device, and it will tell you the blood chemistry, Hbg and Hct.  This is normally a test that you would have to send down to the lab.  I learned that the clinic in Haiti will not electricity.  That means, in addition to not having power to run devices, we also don't have any refrigerator in the clinic.

Me showing off my awesome blood collection technique

 This means that we can't spin down blood and store it, so this device is pretty handy.  So why isn't it used in all labs, or at doctor's offices?  Because the device is very expensive, and the little cartridges cost more per pop then I fork over for a co-pay.

We really wouldn't have the funds to have anything like this in Haiti, but the company that developed them decided to donate the device and 300 cartridges.  This comes to several thousand dollars (they have to give back the machine, but still.)  The amount of generosity that I have seen while preparing for this tip has been pretty incredible.

Figuring out the iStat
(Note: it needs you to configure it to require a barcode.)

And hard to use!  To get the blood, I had to use a little glass tube (similar to a swizzle stick) to get the blood without any bubbles.  Fortunatatly, Julie, the pathologist was more then willing to be a guinea pig as I demonstrated my ability to suck blood.  (She proved to be in good health, according to our iStat.)  There was another person who worked in the lab, Connie, who knew all about getting blood, and she helped us out. She said that she would like to go, hopefully she will be on the next trip.  (So might I!)

We are also taking a bunch of urine sticks, that technology has been power-free for quite some time. I was the guinea pig for that test (no pictures of that, I am afraid!)  I am happy to say that from a urinary standpoint, my health is quite good.
T minus 10 days!