Medical Month

I looked at my calendar yesterday and could only think “wow we actually survived October.”  Before the hurricane, October was already deemed medical month between two surgery teams, a doctor doing mobile clinics, and a medical trip to Mirebalais.  The hurricane just added more on top of the already busy month! 

Several people have asked for a post hurricane update.  To be honest, this zone saw more damage after the hurricane than actually during the hurricane.  The last several weeks have consisted of almost constant downpours.  For our Mole campus, the hurricane’s destruction rerouted some of the water sources.  With all the rain, the river swelled and the campus flooded.  Some of the walls and gates fell and the clinic was knee deep in water.  La baie, which many of you have heard or read about, completely flooded.  Our church there had 5 feet of water in it.  Our staff in La Baie were so desperate for help that one walked part of the way here and one took a boat because the roads were flooded out.  I met with them to find out how we could help.  I was thinking the immediate needs: food, clothes, shelter, etc.  When I brought this up, they said, “Tore, you can give us food for a week, but then we will just be hungry again.”  We made plans on how to help the community beyond these next couple of weeks through buying fishing supplies that was lost and seeds to replant gardens. I sent the staff members with money to start this plan and will go early next week to check on things myself.  My heart breaks for this community who has already gone through so much. 

La Baie

 

While so many hearts were breaking this past month, so much good was also happening.  Though it was questionable whether or not they would be able to make it with the hurricane, the iTeam arrived and went straight to work.  They were a small team, but every member played such a vital role.  They ran the eye clinic and completed 63 eye surgeries.  These eye surgeries truly changed lives.  People who had lost nearly all of their vision due to cataracts were able to see again!  It was an amazing thing to behold, especially in the midst of all of the hurricane reports. 

One week later, the next surgery team arrived.  They had an orthopedic surgeon and a general surgeon.  They completed over 40 major surgeries and many minor surgeries as well! The rain caused us to have to cancel the mobile clinics because we could not cross the river.  We decided to host a clinic for our staff members and their families.   To be honest, I thought we would maybe see 25 patients.  There were so many people we opened the clinic for a second day and easily saw over 200 people.  Most of these people would not have been able to get the care they needed had it not been for the free clinic. 

So many lives were completely changed this month.  Here are a couple of my favorite examples.

During the orthopedic team last year, an 11 year old boy came in with chronic osteomyelitis, or an infection in the bone of his arm.  He had already had the infection for a year and had been turned away from every hospital he went to.  He came to us the last day of surgery of 2015 and there was not enough time for the surgeon to do what needed to be done.  I have a vivid memory of both him and his mom sobbing when they were told we could not help.  We got their information so we could contact them to come this year.  We spent the week before the surgery team arrived trying to get in touch with them.  We couldn’t reach them, and I worried about what might have happened to the boy.  On Wednesday, I was walking through the clinic and a little boy held up his arm to show me.  I yelled his name because I was so excited to see him.  His mom was surprised that I knew his name.  I explained that we had been trying to get a hold of them and I felt broken because we had not reached them.  God had provided.  The surgeon sent them for an x-ray and said we would do whatever we could to help.  My memory of them sobbing was replaced by an image of them waving their arms saying “thank you Jesus, thank you Jesus.”

Thursday, Mike got his surgery.  I spent quite a bit of time talking to him before he went back.  He told me how he wanted to be a bone doctor so he could do these kinds of surgeries.  I went back with him for his surgery, and his mom asked me to keep praying the whole time.  You best believe that’s what I was doing.  At first, we didn’t know if he would be able to keep his arm.  However, as the surgery progressed, the infection was cleaned out and the surgery appears to be successful.  Mike still has a ways to go with 2 weeks of IV antibiotics and 4 weeks or oral antibiotics.  I so hope that one day he can fulfill his dreams of being a bone doctor.  
 

Mike and I before surgery

This same Thursday morning I went down to the clinic to see which patients had already arrived.  There was a young man sitting in the waiting room with what looked like a red cast on his elbow (the lights aren’t the best!).  I was confused because there should not have been any elbow surgery follow ups.  I asked what was going on, and he said he had been cut by a machete.  The red cast was actually blood soaked gauze.  I called the surgeons and they unwrapped his arm to find the bone protruding where the machete had cut through the skin, muscle, and bone.  He had gone to a local hospital, but they turned him away (which usually means they can’t do anything or don’t have much hope).  The team was able to take him back and fix his arm.  God’s provisions in this man’s life were so powerful. The surgeon said the local hospital had tried to place stitches to stop the bleeding.  They had placed a stitch around the ulnar nerve, but thankfully they didn’t tighten it.  Had they tightened it, it would have been a completely different outcome.  If our orthopedic team hadn’t been here, he would have lost his arm and most likely his life.

I closed out the medical month with a quick trip to my favorite hospital in Mirebalais with one of the boys in the orphanage.  This summer the Daybreak team detected a heart murmur on him that we wanted to get checked out.  We got an appointment with the cardiac alliance which meant we made a 12 hour trip to get there.  The doctors evaluated him and gave us the all clear saying it should go away as he ages! 

Keslen and I in Mirebalais

As I sit here and reflect on this past month I am overcome with thankfulness.  I am thankful we weren’t hit worse by the hurricane.  I am thankful for the doctors who gave up their time and energy to come and serve.  I am thankful for all the lives that were changed because of them.  I am thankful for a good medical diagnosis for Keslen and so much more. 

Trying to sum up this past month, I am brought to Jesus’s words in Matthew 11:5, “The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is proclaimed to the poor.”  Jesus called us to be his hands and feet and follow in his footsteps.  These are things He did in his ministry, but the teams this month followed his example.  The blind received sight.  The lame received the opportunity to walk.  We may not have had leprosy, but we did have a case of scabies! :) Most importantly though, the gospel was proclaimed to everyone who walked in our gates.  I can’t think of a more beautiful sound. 

If you are a medical professional and want to be part of this ministry in the future, please contact me (tore.karenbauer@nwhcm.org).  I would love to get you connected with one of the medical teams that come yearly.  We are always in need of more people from surgeons to anesthesiologists to scrub techs to nurses.  I can promise that by coming you will not only change lives, but you will also have your life changed.

Thank you for praying through this month with me.  Please keep me in your prayers as I have a few more weeks before I head stateside for the holidays. I am so thankful for this life God had called me to.  I cannot imagine being anywhere else or doing anything differently.