The Ghanaian Patient

I heard a few stories about my grandfather (from my mother) who was a pharmacist in the city I now reside in.  They were few but facinating stories, ones which constantly resound were the ones which in which my mother would tell me about people who were ill and came to his drug store to get drugs but however could not afford them. My grandfather would pay for the drugs which they came to buy and then top it up by giving them money for transport and at times additionally some money for food.
To me hearing this at a young age, I thought it was the most outrageous story I had ever heard about anybody in  any line of business.  This is what i thought. If you come to my shop and you can not purchase any thing i have in stock, you go back empty handed or go back and top up whatever money you brought and come back and purchase the drug.
Thats how things work right? That is how we make our profits and expand our businesses.
I was never priviledged to meet him as he died a decade before i was born.  He was a very successful person and was survived by 17 children (that is another story).
Now working in the same health field as he did, I completely understand him and I am proud to know this about him.
Moving to this new region to work made me realise that poverty is rife in the country we live in and thousands of people go to bed daily without food or knowing when the next meal is coming up.  For me I think those worse off are those who have illness in which they have to eat before they take thier medications.
Just to place emphasis on this let me side track by introducing you to one such illness, diabetes mellitus. 
This is a condition in which a person has abnormally high levels of sugar in the blood due to the body's inability to either produce a hormone insulin which is under normal circumstances takes the sugar in the blood into the cells in order to produce energy.  Also the sugar levels in the body could also be as a result of the insulin being produced by the body but ineffective to take the sugar into the cells for energy to be made.
The penultimate result is that the presence of abnormally high levels of sugar in blood is deadly. It leads to destuction of the eyes, nerves, heart and blood vessels.
Drugs one takes when they have diabetes would either increase levels of the hormone insulin in the body or stimulate the insulin in the body to work properly.  So taking the drugs would resulting in lowering your abnormally high blood sugar.  The twist to this is that if the blood sugar comes down drastically it results in more sudden death.  So a patient with diabetes is expected to eat and take their medications or else they would die if they take their medications and do not eat.
Madam Adoma is 65years old and lives in a village in the outskirts of the city in which i work.  she missed her last appointment to the clinic 2 weeks ago and came to the hospital with an abnormally high blood glucose and had run out of medications.  When questioned, she told me her story; she lives alone in her hut with no electricity or pipe water.  With no children or grandchildren living close by or even sending remitances to her, she relies on the benevolence of her neighbours.  She does not always have a meal to each daily and when she gets a little bit of money she saves it for either food or some for transport back to the hospital for review.  She is very cautious about taking her medications because when she takes some of them and she does not eat she is found collapsed by her neighbours and this has resulted in some hospital emergency visits.  Because of this she does not take her medications when she does not know when her next meal would be available.
So now sitting infront of me crying about her situation what do i do?  She needs medications for her diabetes, but she has no source of income to buy food, let alone get transportation to and from the clinic for her 2-monthly reviews at the diabetic clinic.  Taking her medications without food would kill her immediately whereas not taking the medications and living with the abnormally high levels of diabetes would also kill her, but a little bit more slowly.
So what would one do when faced with this situation, well my grandfather did what he could do?  I ask myself daily what do.  This is because, this is not an isolated situation.  Not numerous, but enough to make you think twice when you take things for granted, things like food, shelter and clothing. 

My concluding lines were initially going to send a few harsh tones to the colour coded nationals of the country who every 4 years come and make questionable promises to the people of this country whilst the realities of life are ignored.  Instead I woEdit HTMLuld dedicate this piece to my maternal Grandfather Abban who was dedicated in helping the ill and poor in whatever way he could, but died at a very early age.