Tomorrow I'm taking off for Democratic Republic of Congo again, so why I even bothered to go to work is beyond me. Especially because I was on the only one there.
It didn't take me long to finish the few things I needed to do for travel before I went (printing off my official orders, attempting to check-in for my flight only to be told that I have to check-in in person because I'm flying internationally), and then I moved onto the things I knew I needed to do before heading out for two weeks (putting in medication refills, making sure orders were in the computer, etc). All in all, most of the work day was pretty boring, but at least it was quiet, since I had the office to myself.
The one point I had today where I actually got to feel productive was when one of the medics for A Co came in to ask me to look over his medical threat brief for Lesotho. He's not going to Lesotho, but two of his team members are, and it's always the responsibility of the medic to put together a "okay, here's what this country has and here's how you can avoid getting sick" brief. We have a template of the brief that they should give on the medical section website, so they just fill in/delete as needed for the country (for example, Lesotho doesn't have yellow fever or malaria, so you don't need slides for either of those). Unfortunately, he didn't remember that we had a template, so he tried to reinvent the wheel.
For the most part, it wasn't too bad. There were a few things he went into too much detail about--he had a slide about the symptoms and treatment of hepatitis A, when all he really needed to say is 'hepatitis A is transmitted by food and water, and you're vaccinated against it--and a few things he didn't go into enough detail about--what to do about jet lag, how to be safe while traveling, etc. So we went through the template presentation and filled it out for Lesotho, discussing things along the way, such as which vaccines they needed and which they didn't. The medics are all pretty sharp, and this one was no exemption, so he picked up on the stuff pretty quickly. It's still hard for me to remember that they don't have the same training in travel medicine as I do, however, so sometimes I have to stop myself in midst of technical explanations about proper dosing of malaria medications and remind myself to stick to the things they need to know.
Anyway, so that was my bit of excitement for the day. Once we were done discussing Lesotho (and discussing his future career plans), I called it a day (because there was nobody around to tell me I couldn't), put a message on my white board saying that I'm out until 17 June, and headed home to pack/procrastinate about packing. Because honestly, I hate packing and I wish I could pay someone to do it for me.
Friday, May 31, 2013
Monday, May 6, 2013
Out in the Field
Despite my best intentions, I've been neglecting the blog world. Sorry about that. I can't decide if it's that I've been too busy or that things are too routine. Let's just go with that I'm too lazy.
A few weeks ago, though, we did something out of the routine--we went out the field! Kinda. Alpha Company had their Culminating Exercise, which is when they go to a simulated village, in this case in Mali, and demonstrate that they learned something in all of their training.
In theory, anyway.
The week started with the firing range and mass casualty situations, which were to assess how well the medics could triage and determine who to treat first. Overall, they didn't do too well. One medic spent all of her time on a head casualty that should have been triaged as "expectant" (as in, expectant to die). Another went straight to the first casualty and didn't look any further. In other words, we have some work to do.
On days 2-4, they were out in the simulated village in "Mali" (really a remote corner of Ft. Stewart). I got to play a doctor with MSF (Medecines Sans Frontieres, or Doctors Without Borders), which has a very strict "we don't work with the military--any military" policy, so I played that to the best of my abilities. This is me yelling at one of the team leaders (my friend Dan) for their actions throughout the village and how we just wanted them to leave.
The other two officers in my office, MAJ Greifenstein, the environmental science officer (in red) and CPT Avriette, the veterinarian (the girl) also got to play parts, both as USAID scientists (he a soil science, she a vet... we were really imaginative). In the course of playing a soil scientist, Griff was digging holes, and instead of the teams asking him what he was doing (which they were supposed to do), they reported him for burying land mines and declared entire roads off-limits. Not quite the reaction we were going for.
In all, it was a fun week in the field (because, well, we weren't in the office), but the teams have a lot to learn about operating in Africa. Maybe I have an advantage, because I've only been on "peacetime missions" and no deployments to Iraq or Afghanistan. I don't really have a combat mindset, but all the team members have been deployed in combat situations, and that's what they revert to when they think of going overseas. As I've said in multiple conversations to multiple people, Africa is not Iraq or Afghanistan. Not only that, but civil affairs shouldn't be about combat. It's not about going into a village with weapons, ready to shoot the bad guys. It's about getting to know people and winning trust, and not assuming that there's a bad guy behind every door.
It's a work in progress, I guess.
A few weeks ago, though, we did something out of the routine--we went out the field! Kinda. Alpha Company had their Culminating Exercise, which is when they go to a simulated village, in this case in Mali, and demonstrate that they learned something in all of their training.
In theory, anyway.
The week started with the firing range and mass casualty situations, which were to assess how well the medics could triage and determine who to treat first. Overall, they didn't do too well. One medic spent all of her time on a head casualty that should have been triaged as "expectant" (as in, expectant to die). Another went straight to the first casualty and didn't look any further. In other words, we have some work to do.
On days 2-4, they were out in the simulated village in "Mali" (really a remote corner of Ft. Stewart). I got to play a doctor with MSF (Medecines Sans Frontieres, or Doctors Without Borders), which has a very strict "we don't work with the military--any military" policy, so I played that to the best of my abilities. This is me yelling at one of the team leaders (my friend Dan) for their actions throughout the village and how we just wanted them to leave.
The other two officers in my office, MAJ Greifenstein, the environmental science officer (in red) and CPT Avriette, the veterinarian (the girl) also got to play parts, both as USAID scientists (he a soil science, she a vet... we were really imaginative). In the course of playing a soil scientist, Griff was digging holes, and instead of the teams asking him what he was doing (which they were supposed to do), they reported him for burying land mines and declared entire roads off-limits. Not quite the reaction we were going for.
In all, it was a fun week in the field (because, well, we weren't in the office), but the teams have a lot to learn about operating in Africa. Maybe I have an advantage, because I've only been on "peacetime missions" and no deployments to Iraq or Afghanistan. I don't really have a combat mindset, but all the team members have been deployed in combat situations, and that's what they revert to when they think of going overseas. As I've said in multiple conversations to multiple people, Africa is not Iraq or Afghanistan. Not only that, but civil affairs shouldn't be about combat. It's not about going into a village with weapons, ready to shoot the bad guys. It's about getting to know people and winning trust, and not assuming that there's a bad guy behind every door.
It's a work in progress, I guess.
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