An Update... finally

I guess the idea of having three journals was just a little too much! While doing the fieldwork it was enough effort to maintain one journal online, so I chose to keep a more personal blog of our travels- Which you can check out here. However I thought I'd update this page anyway- just in case anybody is actually still bothering to check it, and because I don't want to fill up our personal web pages with a lot of detail about the thesis.The thesis is now officially about 20000 words and 3 chapters long- oin other words about half way. Except its not half way... those 20000 words need some revision and rewriting, and I still haven't touched the major discussion chapters. I have more or less completed the methodology chapter, the usual discussion of the broad approach (qualitative), methods used (interviews, questionairres, observation) and data analysis (ongoing!). I have also completed a overview chapter on Health, Development and STMMs, which is more or less a literature review. I used some of the lit review I abandoned before the fieldwork, along with some new stuff. I am currently finishing a background chapter on health and Honduras, and have done some beginning work on a discussion chapter, looking at what the teams actually do and why. I continue to learn a lot as I write up my work of the past ten months- about Honduras, about health in developing nations, and about the role and consequences of outside intervention in development and health. I can see there are huge needs in Honduras, and big gaps in the health care system that these teams are attempting to fill. At present they do appear to provide a needed service, yet huge questions remain about the appropriateness of using outside teams, and the long term impacts they have on health and health care services. Maybe more answers will come as I get into the writing.