IN Britain in the 1960s, patients with venereal disease were directed to the Special Clinic which was often in a back street and only opened in the evening, presumably because no-one requiring their services wanted to be seen by their bank manager, employer or wife. Medical students were required to attend sessions at these sanctuaries for the careless as part of the infectious diseases course. Dale Carnegie had obviously never been a client as public relations and making the afflicted feel, if not exactly welcome, then at least accepted, were not often on the Special Clinic staff’s agenda.
Entering the tawdry premises in Glasgow’s Cowcaddens one wintry evening, the nurse behind a small desk didn’t raise her head at my greeting. Thrusting a bottle in my direction, she gestured towards a cubicle.
“Over there, Jimmy. Pee in the pot. Trousers aff. Pants aff. Wait for the doctor mannie.”
“But I’m from the university. I’ve come to..."
“You yins at uni are as bad as everyone else, sonny. Uni or not, it’s nae odds tae me – just pee in the pot.”
In Swaziland, my introduction to gonorrhoea was courtesy of a student nurse who was translating for me in the hospital’s Outpatient clinic.
“This is babe Sikhondze. He is a reverend,” she lisped, indicating a fresh-faced young man with a big cross slung round his neck. “His problem is ‘drop’."
“Beg your pardon?”
“He’s got ‘drop’, doctor – from his pipe,” she added helpfully, using the slang term for the Holy One’s appendage.
This was the first time I’d heard the local description for the disease’s presentation as a bead of pus. Faced with the visible evidence of a jolly romp, Africa’s sufferers behave in exactly the same way as their European cousins. Asked why they’ve come to see you and they’re off – vague headaches, itchy eyes, a sore back, on they ramble until just about to take their leave when they would mutter sotto voce about ‘loss of power’. Their problem is, in fact, excess of power but channelled up a creek where their paddle has got itself barnacled.
Nowadays I find it kinder to short-circuit proceedings. The consulting room door bursts open and in he breezes, smiling for no reason, brushing an imaginary bit of dust off his shirt, asking how you are, then replying on your behalf. He will make eye contact with the nurse and suggest she leaves.
“Lukhele...!” you cut in.
“Yes, doc?”
“You’ve got ‘drop’, haven’t you?”
"Who? Me?”
You indicate that there are now only two of you at this confessional.
“Well – ah – yes – no! How did you...?”
“Lukhele, trousers off. Pants off. Pee in the pot...”
Some patients are not as reticent. Not long ago I was minding my own business selecting sweet potatoes and pawpaws in the village market when a taxi-driver greeted me. I returned his good wishes but was unsettled at seeing him unzip his trousers. Would I mind, he asked, giving him an opinion on a little local difficulty that had been worrying him? The stalls were crowded but none of the passers-by appeared concerned or upset that Mfanasibili was now trying to find the exact spot on his pride and joy for a professional inspection. For a moment, I tried to visualise this consultation taking place in Fortnum and Mason’s cold meat and pate emporium off Oxford Street in London. Would their customers have been as understanding, let alone the magistrate the following morning?
Mars and Venus were uncomfortably in evidence from the very first day working in Kampala when our medical superintendent and specialist physician, Sister Veronica Cotter, introduced us to two dozen fellow males in St Patrick’s ward at Nsambya Hospital. All had large red rubber catheters protruding from their lower bellies, the consequence of repeated attacks of gonorrhoea sustained in the line of duty tasting the fruits of the Pearl of Africa.
Veronica gave me a knowing look and raised one eyebrow.
“Ah, yes, ‘tis a dangerous place, Uganda, David. Beautiful but – eh – dangerous!”
I felt a distinct shrivelling of my own nether regions. Imagine a St Patrick’s man trying to be romantic – at the crucial moment, he’d need the services of a plumber or a hydraulic engineer.
Dr David Vost studied medicine at Glasgow University and is currently working at a hospital in Swaziland. He and his family live on a small farm in Northern Uganda near the Albert Nile. davidvostsz@gmail.com
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