Over the past week I got to make my second trip off the island. This time, I only went as far as La Ceiba (where the ferry takes us) where I worked with a mission group from Texas. For the past several years, this mission group has been coming down to Honduras to work for a week with an Episcopal Church. Part of the group works with tutoring the school children, another group works with medical and eye glasses, and the third part of the group works on construction projects. Myself and 3 other volunteers from Roatan worked with the medical team of course. Everyday began with breakfast at 6:30, followed by morning prayer before we all headed out our seperate ways. Tuesday through Thursday, we spent the mornings working in the clinic with the Honduran doctor that is always there. Dr. Silvio Azure typically sees around 80 patients a week; so anywhere around 20 patients a day. Upon walking into the clinic the first day, I was rather taken aback.
There was next to nothing in this clinic. There was an open room that served as their waiting room but there was nothing more than a bench on each side of the room for patients to sit on. Behind the front desk was not only the files, the bathroom, and the admission area, but the triage area as well. Triaging consisted of taking a blood pressure, weight, and tempurature. No chief complaints were gathered, no blood sugar was checked for diabetics, no pulse or pulse oxygenation levels were gathered. And although the temperature was taken, every temp was either 36 or 37 Celsius- even if they had a fever! The consult rooms had just about as much- an exam table, a desk, and a couple chairs. There were a few medical supplies but if there was something you actually needed, chances are it wouldn't be there. The pharmacy had a smattering of medications, but of course, it lacked many as we waiting all week for the ordered medications to be released from customs. The "lab" consisted of a chair used as a desk and another chair for the patient to sit in along side the pharmacy out in the hallway. The clinic had a storage room, but the supplies that were in there were mainly eyeglasses. With very little to work with, I must say, I actually thoroughly enjoyed my time spent in this clinic. It was very much serving the poor in a location that wasn't all ritzy yet had the essentials to be able to treat these patients adequately and appropriately. While the clinic lacked in many of the medical/technological advances that are now seen in the health care field in the US, it focused on treating the root causes of the problems (such as nutrition, lifestyle, etc) and left the rest up to God. These people search out medical treatment but they still keep sight of their faith; for some of these people faith is all they have, but that is enough for them. This was enhanced even more when we went out to a village, La Linea, on Thursday afternoon to do a health clinic.
One of the guys that we treated came to us with a problem of not being able to make a fist with one hand because of a machete wound he suffered 5 or 6 years ago. He was asking us about whether there was a surgery or medications we could give him to correct it. I had to tell him there were no meds other than some pain pills that we could give him. I told him they could do an operation to fix his tendons but that was about it. His response was that he is a poor man and surgery is expensive, is there nothing else he/we can do? Once again I reiterated that surgery was all that could be done. Then he wanted to know the likelihood of the surgery actually helping his hand- would he still be able to work out at the plantation? You see, his first three fingers worked fairly well, they were just a bit weak. His 4th and 5th fingers however, were straight, unable to be bend due to tendon damage. Since his accident happened such a long time ago, he would most likely need a tendon graft done as well because the tendons have permanently shortened. After surgery there would be no guarantee that his hand would be all that much better. So I told him that surgery was possible but probably not available in Honduras and it would be a complicated surgery. His reply was that we would just have to pray to God for strength. I replied, yes, for now all we can do is take meds to control any pain and pray to God for help. He thanked us and was on his way. Wow! Even people with little to nothing, having difficulty working due to injury still have faith in God. Can we say the same thing? Would we have this same faith or would we have given up on Him long before? It's in situations like this that I am reassured that there are people that still have faith and trust in God. They don't give up easily just because something didn't happen in their favor. If only more people could see things like this and gain renewed strength and faith in God- even through the hard times. Then as we were getting ready to leave, he came up to me and asked if I could take a picture of us. Even though he would never see me again, and never get the picture, I believe he wanted me to have a picture of us so that I could remember our encounter for years to come. What a great day it was!
So, while almost everyone on the mission group as well as the 3 I traveled with spent a day or two of their time with Montezuma's revenge, I was able to enjoy my week full force and really soak up the work that god was doing in this community. Not only did I work with the medical team, but I learned a little more advanced way of fitting people for eyeglasses using foropters and constructing glasses to test for astigmatisms and the whole shpeal. So I guess, if nursing fails, I can always take up optometry! Working with this mission group allowed me to see what it's like working with a community that is very accepting of a short term mission team coming in and working with them. Oh how I cannot wait to do more mission trips in the future. Therefore, at the rate I'm going, I should probably come to appreciate the letters d-e-b-t as I will be seeing them for quite some time! Save your change folks, it could get you far someday.
Peace and Love to all those at home!!
Laura
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