efficiency?

For a patient to be seen on a Tuesday (and I assume other days though I don’t know) they come in through the outpatients receiving room…where they get a stamp in their health passports (medical records that they keep). They are to get weighed and temperature taken…then they pay 80MK (roughly $.40) for a consult. On a regular day this will get them seen by a clinical officer (Malawian equivalent to a very junior doctor?). on clinic days this gets them to the doctor…so they come to the hallway outside the doctors rooms…and they sit. There is no order for anything. An assistant comes by and takes the passports into the first room where I have a feeling they get shuffled (I really think it should be first come first serve but the books are constantly being mixed up)…they are called in to get their blood pressures done and blood sugars if needed and then they go back out to wait in the hallway while the books go into the next room for the doctor…of course the time taken depends on the number of doctors who are there that day and whether there are complications in the patients…and of course if you are a headman of a village or area or a staff member or related to a staff member (as it feels like everyone is) you don’t have to wait—often getting bumped to the front of the stacks…even though others have been waiting for ages…and then I have to remember to take a deep breath and know that everyone will get seen…