Happy 4th of July everyone! Yesterday we took the CPAP gear out to Machinga. We tested out the pulse oximeter on a few babies that had just been born and got everything set up in the nursery. The Machinga trainees were really happy to see the CPAP actually on their ward. Then on the way back to Blantyre, we stopped by Zomba to check up on things and see how everything was going with the new CPAP cart. When we arrived there was a little girl with bronchiolitus in very poor condition and getting worse. Her oxygen saturations were at about 50% even when she was on oxygen therapy (below 90% is not good). They had been waiting on a doctor to get a recommendation, but since we had brought two of our CPAP nurses along with us, Sister Patridge and Glyssie, they decided we should definitely put the baby on CPAP. So our Machinga trainee Roseby went ahead and helped put Machinga’s very first pediatric CPAP patient on the machine. The bCPAP can make such a dramatic difference when small children are in respiratory distress, and yesterday it was really amazing to be able to see the results of so many’s people’s hard work. It’s easy to get caught up in data analysis and mountains of medical charts, but this was one of those days when I feel so blessed to be able to help with this project. It’s crazy to think that Pumani bCPAPs will soon be all over Malawi!