I have just returned from Old Fangak, Jonglei State, South Sudan after my fourth trip. I seem to have earned a welcome there for teaching bedside ultrasound to anyone who will learn and doing ultrasound whenever anybody asks. Also I cook a mean soup and make delicious chocolate sauce in which a homesick American can dip a piece of local deep fried bread dough. The hospital I visit is a community health center which has morphed into a full service hospital for tens of thousands of people displaced by chronic civil war. Jill Seaman, a doctor friend from my home town and a champion of treatment for complex and fatal tropical diseases (particularly Kala Azar and tuberculosis), has coordinated the multiple functions of this center for years. It serves as a distribution point for food aid, a triage center for war wounded when the war is close by, a referral center for treatment of tuberculosis and Kala Azar and now a major outpost for Doctors Without Borders (Medecins sans Frontieres--MS...
The cost of health care in the US is higher than anywhere else in the world, and yet we are not healthier than our peer nations. In fact, in terms of such measures as infant mortality and life span, we don't measure up. Why is this? Many people involved in providing or receiving care have some pretty good ideas about what costs so much, and what we can do to reduce costs and improve quality. Sharing these stories is an important step in creating affordable universal health care.