We have been busy this Spring Break season with two surgical teams and three university teams. With the additional help we were able to offer eye surgery, orthopedics, general and gynecologic surgeries to 182 patients at Hospital Ezell with Abilene Christian University helping out and mobile medical/dental teams in the Chichicastenango area with Lipscomb University and Harding University PA school students that attended over 600 primary care patients in the communities.
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| Our star recovery team with Aaron and Jessica keeping things calm. |
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| Mobile medical/dental in Xepol. Tight squeeze but a good day! |
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| We did well-baby checkups on our Nutrition Program babies. |
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| Harding PA's biggest fans! |
Family Counseling Services
Our counseling services in the highlands has gotten off to a good start this year with our two psychologists working now. One of of my recent referrals was an 8 year old epilepsy patient who didn't want to take his medicine and was having some anger issues. His grandfather shared with me that his his single mother re-married and left him to be raised by the grandparents. I invited them to go talk to our pastoral counselor Gaspar, and they had a good long talk together. He suggested they visit one of our psychologists and the patient and his grandfather were eager for the help.
Cancer Care Services
We have a great relationship with the people from Faith in Practice--a non profit working with the Hermano Pedro hospital in Antigua. They have offered to help our cervical cancer patients get the work up needed to get enrolled in the cancer hospital. This usually consists of CAT scans, labs, etc. And they help get the patient to the cancer hospital. We are grateful for this coordination of services, as we frequently see cervical cancer cases. This month we referred two women for treatment and pray for God's guidance and healing and for their faith to grow in this time.
Diabetes Care
Our area has a very high incidence of diabetes type II. It is a common occurance for patients to present with blood glucose over 500 and severe weight loss. One of my patients Maria came in with a 12-year history of diabetes, not tolerating oral medication and dense cataracts in both eyes. She had lost over 30 lbs. weighing in at 87lbs. After a long talk with her and the family, we convinced them to try insulin. Although they come from 3 hours away, they asked to come back the following week to check her sugar in our clinic. Thankfully she got down into the low 200s and had already gained back 3 lbs. They were so surprised how easy the insulin was and how well she tolerated it. We prayed together and thanked God and prayed for her future cataract surgery.
Equipment repairs
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| Making do until our wall oxygen regulator gets repaired in the recovery area. |
In the healthcare arena we work with a lot specialized equipment and instrumentation. Finding repair technicians isn't always the easiest thing here. Thankfully God had provided us with several gifted maintainance staff. When possible Kemmel encourages them to continue learning about our medical equipment as well. They have worked on our dental equipment, autoclave maintenance and are learning how to care for some of our OR equipment. We thank God for always providing for our needs in this ministry!
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| Not exactly a pearl gate, but still a welcoming sight for patients all the same! (photo credit: Jessica Jocoy) |
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