November 10, 2005 - Medical Adventures (and Misadventures)
by Michel & Jane DeRidder

	Speedy recovery.

Luck aplenty is what has kept us safe all these many years - luck, and a firm belief in simplicity of medical treatment.

Luck to be fast healers. Luck never to have been struck down with a major illness, or a major accident.

We've had some minor incidents. One of us, having an unlucky day, cracked and broke a few ribs by falling into a hatch hidden by taped-on newspaper during a deck paint prep job. We've broken toes, cut feet and hands, suffered minor scalds, abrasions and bruises, burst eardrums, suffered tummy upsets, but seldom had to put up with anything much worse other than a mild bout of dengue fever and a mini-case of ciguatera fish poisoning.

Once we were knocked down and Michel knocked out - hit by a car when we were on our motorcycle. We were badly bruised. The decorations were impressive. The bike, bent out of shape, healed more quickly than we did.

We were extremely lucky to have had doctors in the anchorage when something really serious did crop up. Michel loves coconut. He once ate so much that he plugged his gut good and proper and became truly ill - vital signs out of whack, high fever, out-of-control shivering, agonizing pain, the works. Our attending doctors suggested that he fly to New Zealand in case he should need an emergency operation, to which he replied, "I'd rather die on the boat." The doctors conferred and decided to rehydrate him. He came right, to the relief of us all, aided by good luck and plenty of TLC (and antibiotics once he could hold them down).

Medical library.

We carry the usual array of first aid equipment as well as surgical instruments, sutures, antibiotics. You name it. Some of these items have never seen the light of day. So far, the only wound stitching with our instruments on our boat was reluctantly performed by a pathologist sewing together his own son who had suffered a nasty cut. Every so often we ask a doctor to go over our supplies to toss out what should no longer be kept, and to prescribe replacements. They are usually shocked at the "use by" dates. Mind you, we are not alone. A doctor friend tells of trying to locate medication for a case of malaria on one of the cruising boats and finding that almost all of the medications on nearby yachts were well and truly out of date.

We have several books to guide us medically: first aid books and medical guides. Where There Is No Doctor is well thumbed as is Current Medical Diagnosis and Treatment, and Industrial First Aid. Advanced First Aid Afloat has many times been referred to. We are particularly fascinated by the chapter on amputations: "Have extra hack saw blades available...Drop the amputated extremity into the bucket and chuck it overboard." Fortunately we have never had to deal with anything that major. Butterfly sutures have been the things most in demand so far on our vessel.

But the most valuable of all our medical books is one listing and describing various drugs. New Ethicals Catalogue replaces a far heavier, much older US tome. The real value of these books purporting to give "complete drug information" lies in the terrifying lists of "contraindications". We become ill or infected. We look in our medicine chest. We select a likely looking medication. We read all about it. Then deciding that the possible side effects are too severe to risk in a remote anchorage, we take nothing other than plenty of water. Water and rest - and lo and behold, we recover.

We did go to a weekly class called Medicine at Sea. Once we were required to bring a chicken thigh and an orange, the first to use to practise suturing, the second to practise injections. A few of us decided that we would all cut and sew up the same thigh so as not to waste food. Michel, after watching my cack-handed suturing job, said that he would never permit me to lay a hand on him. He'd rather do it himself. We critically watched each other cut and then suture the chicken thigh, and then inject one of the oranges until the injected water squirted out of the previous holes. We invited the others back to Magic Dragon and cooked duck a l'orange out of the leftover chicken and oranges.

Tea tree oil we use for minor skin infections and insect bites. Mercurochrome was always our treatment for coral cuts, the same red potion that we had dabbed on us as children. It works. When I scalded my hand rather badly it was aloe plant that we used to rub on the burn - after I could bear to take it out of ice water, that is. Coughs, colds and sore throats we treat with hot lemonade made with manuka honey, with or without rum. A fractured ankle we didn't get to a doctor for a full week, by which time the swelling had gone down and the bruising had come up. My walking cast, ever so much more convenient than our improvised pillow and belt cast, disintegrated within three weeks (it was the first one that the nurse had ever done) leaving me with a limp and adhesions, later dealt with by a physio. A nasty thumb-cut to the bone that Michel suffered when diving to debarnacle the bottom of the keel just before we set off on an ocean crossing, we stuck together with micropore tape. On the rough, wet first few days of the passage (we were trying to outrun a cyclone) the tape had to be replaced a few times, but the dragon man healed in his usual speedy way. Which is not to say that he hasn't been more seriously afflicted over the years. He has survived surgery - an abominable abdominal operation, followed by a hernia op brought on by too much action too soon. His feet are a bit less than perfect. They've lost some sensation. We've ceased doing offshore passages for the time being. But his feet are showing improvement after B complex vitamins were suggested by a holidaying Canadian neurologist - an old-fashioned cure for numb feet and legs apparently no longer in favor.

Medical supplies.

I too have had my moments. In Majuro I suddenly began to suffer from severe vertigo. When after a week or so I could finally get ashore to see a doctor, the lovely young intern told me she thought I'd suffered transient ischemic attacks (mini-strokes) and that I should really have an EKG. Theirs was out of order. Sail down to Honiara, she advised, giving me a huge bottle of aspirins. We set forth for the voyage, whereupon my cheek began to ache terribly and I felt very unwell. Suddenly, after a few hours, there was blessed relief when pus poured out of my ear. It was my good luck that the drum had ruptured. We'd had no inkling that a middle ear infection had caused my dizziness. In Honiara the sawbones gave me boracic acid and drinking straws so that Michel could blow the powder into my ear. Michel went one better, cutting a length of soft plastic tubing so I could blow it into my own ear. My hearing is super-sensitive in that ear today after having had a solid plug of goodness knows what aspirated out by an ear specialist. Trouble was I had to give up diving, one of my passions.

My hands no longer grasp small lines securely. One knee is a bit wonky. Chondroitin glucosomine sulphate is my self-prescribed form of treatment. If it's used for racehorses I reckon it's got to be good.

When I put my back out not long ago I took some muscle relaxants till I could move a bit, then carefully did a Tai Chi movement and presto - it popped back into place!

We realize the extreme good luck that has helped us through this way of life. Here we are, septuagenarians and still going strong. We know of cruisers who've had to swallow the anchor because of malaria, dengue fever, hepatitis, and all manner of serious ailments and accidents. With a combined age of almost 150 years, some day soon we may have to seek younger custodians for our very magic Magic Dragon. Mind you, we have friends in their eighties who still cruise about happily, one of them sailing his liveaboard yacht with only Fizz Bomb the cat for crew.