Dinner at Slim River

This is a glimpse of my dinner tonight.

All of this – home cooked by the two of us.
I think we’re really improving a lot.

Christians and Contraception

For the past few weeks, I have been working on a project with my boss to come up with a presentation for our hospital folks with regards to the various methods of contraception available. This topic is pretty much our bread and butter in the O&G Department as we will only discharge a mother who has just delivered once she has decided upon a contraception of her choice.

The in-depth reading and researching about this brought up several questions about the sciences behind these methods of contraception and the morality which revolves around that. I’ve had such a struggle even back in medical school but never really paid as much attention to it as I should.

And now it’s part of my business. I’m giving advice to women everyday about using contraception to plan their families and to space their pregnancies, and now upon properly realizing this, I stand back in horror to what I’ve encouraged some women to do and use (but with the back up of strong medical reasons).

• What methods of contraception are available today?
• How does each method work in preventing pregnancy?
• What does the Bible say about contraception?
• As a Christian medical practitioner, how do I stand in this dilemma of advising women for the contraception they’re suitable for, but those that stands against my moral conscience?

So it was time to dig deeper past the medical journals and evidences about what works and what does not, to the reading materials which set one’s mind straight about the moral and ethical issues behind contraception.

This article was a great help to highlight the Biblical view towards this topic. Here’s another super useful article which talks about each type of contraception and explains how each works for its purpose.

So where do I stand in the definition of where does life begin? Personally, I believe it’s when fertilization takes place. This is really important because by that I have already crossed out several methods which would go against that belief. 

This is where it gets difficult for me. Do I encourage women to use contraception? If so, what type would I advise them to use? Most of the time, we’d counsel them to use the ones with only progestogen in it so as to promote milk production for breast feeding. There is a risk of fertilization in these type of contraception as it works by preventing implantation of the fertilized egg on to the wall of the womb.

Have I done wrong in promoting this type of contraception as a doctor?

Here’s an even increasing problem for me. We have a lot of obese women here, well.. it’s not just a Slim River problem, in fact, it’s everywhere. We just have a lot of obese people around and many of them are pregnant women. The giving of hormonal form of contraception would greatly increase their risk of deep vein thrombosis and other various medical illness, which is why we often advise women who are obese to use the barrier kinds of contraception – either the condom or the intrauterine contraceptive device (IUCD).

FYI, the failure rate of the condom is greater than the other methods and based on what I’ve heard and seen from my patients, men simply just don’t favour them and they’re hardly used. That leaves with the only other option of IUCD insertion – a little device thing we insert into the womb to prevent implantation. Yup. You read that right. Prevent implantation. Fertilization does take place in that womb but because the IUCD creates a hostile environment within that implantation of that fertilized egg cannot take place and therefore is expelled. It is an abortifacient. This is where I stand in horror. I guess I have known about this before, but never really consciously act upon it. I have advised women for IUCD and worse still, I have inserted so many in my line of work. How can I consciously stay clean of this?

I can’t! What do I do? Stop advising for IUCD, let alone for contraception? But I can’t do that as a doctor, as there are so many other complications of being pregnant too many times or having poor spacing between pregnancies!

Help! Any ideas?

Secret Society?

Dear all,

Has anybody ever noticed these gold swirly lines on the numerous car number plates in KL?

I’ve seen them around many months back, even before moving to Slim River, but never quite had the opportunity to capture them on camera.

Does anyone have any idea what do these symbols mean?

Is it a secret symbol to those belonging to some exclusive society?

Perhaps a religious symbol of some sort?

Anyone?

Angry Birds

I’ll let the pictures do the talking.
This goes to show how much I play this crazily fun addictive game.

Can’t wait to try the Angry Birds Rio version!

New Hospital Quarters

When I first arrived at Hospital Slim River in September last year, I was told that the new hospital quarters were at its last stages into completion and should be ready by the end of the year.

Well, it’s now done and just waiting approval for its new occupants to move in. Nope, I’m not even thinking of booking a place there.

Take a look at these pictures. The hospital and its quarters can actually be seen along the North-South Highway.

Notice the tall tall stilts on which it stands. Scary, especially that it’s situated on a steep slope. The hospital confirms that the structure is safe despite how it looks…. ehhh.. I’m not too sure about that, and I wouldn’t dare try either!