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PDA as Medicine?
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I just returned from a medical-mission surgical trip to Guatemala. Most of the work I
did was in surgery prep and instrument sterilization. What this means is that I had periods
of intense work, separated by periods of boredom while I was waiting for the next cycle.
Thinking ahead, I had brought the Axim along to entertain myself during the downtime. I played a few games, listened
to some mp3's, and worked on a couple of articles using the folding keyboard. It was a convenient
distraction while I was waiting for an autoclave to heat up or for the surgeons to complete their next case.
But, it was when they brought in a 5-year old girl for a hernia operation, that I became so thankful I had brought
my pda along. The doctors were understandably a little more serious for this case. They wanted
the smallest instruments they could get and we actually put together a surgery tray using a bunch of tiny plastic surgery
tools normally used for delicate reconstruction.
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The surgery went fine and they moved the girl to the recovery ward. After she woke up, she was in quite a
bit of discomfort and scared of the strange surroundings. I was talking with the nurses when I remembered
that I had a full-screen Divx file of Disney's Toy Story which I had ripped and put on a secure digital card.
I asked her mother if it was ok, and handed the little girl the pda with the movie playing.
It was like magic. The little girl completely forgot about her pain and was entranced by the movie, even
though she couldn't understand the dialog. She watched the whole thing, struggling at the end to stay awake.
Her mother told me as her daughter slept that it was the first movie the girl had ever seen.
After that, the nurses would come get the pda whenever we had a child in recovery. They said it was some of the
best medicine for the kids on the whole. Seeing that little girl forget about her pain for a little while, I think
I got the most out of it.
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