The team was very busy with two days of outreach clinics out in Maasai land to provide medical care to people who do not have access to medical care. I provide free clinics with free medications and treatment. Through our assessments if I determine they need additional medical care, I fill out a referral sheet and they will be coming to see the team at clinic on Monday. The stories of the people and what they have had to endure broke my heart. Because of the high poverty level, Hope Ministries will be paying for their medical care and surgeries.
We saw 260 patients in two days and I am referring 36 patients for additional medical care at Selian Hospital. As I told Julius…..we need to rob a bank in order to pay for all these surgeries and medical treatments. But I know God will provide and it warmed my heart to see how the patients smiled when I told them we would help them. Thanks to all of you for providing these people with hope and a chance for life.
A story that touched my heart was a women that came in with an extremely high BP that could have had a stroke because it was so high. I referred her to the hospital for IV treatment for high BP and will continue to support her with oral BP meds. So many people will be given meds to treat high BP but when the meds are gone they cannot afford to get more meds so they present to our clinics with extremely high BP’s. This mother came back and was crying and she said that her husband died and she had two children she was trying to support. She borrowed money to pay for her two children to go to school, and because of lack of income she has not been able to pay her back. She said they said they were sending the police to come and take her to jail. The jails here are unbelievable and not a place you want anyone to be put. I asked the social worker to get the village leader to see if the community could assist the poor desperate women. I also had to write a note about her medical condition so the police did not come take her to jail. God bless her and praise God for sending her to me to get some help.
Alinda: A patient that specifically touched me was one I wasn’t expecting. I thought the patients with the awful tumors, or crying children would be the ones that would move me to tears, but instead a patient with a high blood pressure and a minor stroke was the one that hit me the hardest. He had had the stroke back in March and had worked very hard to gain function back of his right side, but because he lost so much function it was hard for him to work for money for his medicine to keep his blood pressure controlled so he wouldn’t have another stroke. When I realized he wasn’t in the clinic to help us find out what was wrong with him, but simply in there begging to have us help him pay for medication to prevent another stroke, I had to take a step back and walk across the room to control my tears. In the States, I have worked with many patients after having strokes, and I have seen the way it affects not only the patient, but the patient’s families. It makes daily living so hard, but we have great insurance that provides us with the ability to put our loved ones in nursing homes, or to pay for therapy to gain function back and meds to help prevent another (or a first one). This man had kids at home and a wife to care for and family that loved him, but putting food on the table for his family meant sacrificing his health and possibly even his life. If he had what we had in the States, he may have never had that stroke, wouldn’t have to worry every day about another one because he would have meds to control it, and wouldn’t have to worry about his kids being raised without a father. I am so thankful that Hope Ministries was able to tell him that we will cover his medication, and that he can report to our outreach clinic whenever he needs more medication.
The last clinic was so challenging and at the end the team was exhausted. The nursing students did an awesome job and now have been exposed to medical conditions they will not see in the states. They really learned alot about assessment skills and how to identify abnormal conditions. They are going to be some great nurses, they show alot of compassion and love for their patients.
At the end of the day, there were two women waiting to see me. They had been standing waiting to see me for 9 1/2 hours. When the team asked them what they needed they said they wanted to see Mama Gayle but not to bother her because she was busy. They were two women that we assist with our financial outreach clinic and I referred for surgery and they came back to thank me. They cried as they hugged me and kept saying “Mungu Akubariki” which means God bless you.
I saw the one lady in July and she had huge open wound on her lower leg and ankle because of an accident. Her husband left her and she had to sell her house to get medical care. She then moved in with her father and this wound continued to be open and infected. I brought her in and we took her to surgery for debridement and she has since had skin grafting and Hope Ministries paid for her care.
The other lady who has had ovarian cyst for years suffering with severe pain. She saved money to go to the hospital which they did an ultrasound and they gave her the diagnosis. They told her she needed surgery and she had not money. So she showed up in our outreach clinic and I sent her to an OB/GYN doctor and they performed surgery. She hugged me and cried and cried because she was so thankful and now free from pain. She kept saying God bless you, God bless you. She cried and I cried and the whole team was in tears. We will try to post a video on this post, if it is not possible I will post to our facebook page.
Please continue to pray for us. Love you all.
God bless,
Mama Gayle
