Hi,

Since getting a webmaster to follow me on all my different projects is almost impossible, I will post the info and pics on my medical missions here on the blog. I will try to make it as pleasant looking as possible. I am like a year and a half behind and will try to catch up on all the medical missions I have attended as all had great stories and people.

Today, I want to share with you the medical mission I attended in Tequila, Mexico in october 2008. I tried uploading pictures last night and it did not work so I need to wait…

All right, so we have a go! I can upload pictures and tell you about the medical mission in Tequila, Mexico.

Since, I am joining the Austin medical mission group Texas, I needed to arrive one day earlier in Guadalajara, Mexico. I got a ride from the airport from Georgia and Tony two Americans now living in Mexico. Although they kindly offered me to stay at their house, I had already made arrangements to stay at the El Tapatio Hotel for the night. The staff was friendly and my room was huge.

El tapatio hotel, self-picture

My terrace at the Hotel

 After a nice hot shower (the last one for a week! ), a great 5$ club sandwich, I took a long night of sleep.

In the morning, Georgia and Tony came to get me and we went to meet with the group from Texas. It is always a pleasure to see my friends again. We were a group of about 30 people composed of nurses, dentists, doctors, one chiropractor, translators and support staff.

The dentists were held up at customs for three hours as the customs agents were concerned they could be bringing in instruments to sell them.

After a nice ride on the bus catching-up with my friends we arrived in Tequila.

Tequila church

We then settled in the place where we were going to sleep for the week. Francisco Perez, a member of our team is from Tequila and his extended family was our host. We ate like kings!

Francisco Perez, Liz and me in Tequila

 On the first day of the medical mission, we stayed in Tequila. The pace was very moderate compared to what we are used to so we had time to get together with the group.

I was shocked to realize that I had seen in one day seven cases of cerebral palsy!

Dr Rick Barrett, our chiropractor, was very busy and for lack of space, we needed to set-up his office on the second floor. Rick always accepted my requests with a gracious smile when I asked him to come down and treat a patient that was in a wheelchair. Everytime, he just brought his treatment table down and worked on whoever needed it.

Dr Barrett working on Leti, a 15 year old girl who had cerebral palsy and hydrocephalia

We work as a team

When I go on medical missions, I attend to the children and women under 35 years old as I have not seen adults in my practice with such conditions as diabetes and high blood pressure in many years.

Beautiful Baby seen during my day

 On the second day of mission, we stayed in Tequila. During those two days, I saw three children suffering from a very rare disease called ” epidermolysis bullosa”. It is said that in the general population, only 5 people out of one million have this disease yet in the small town of Tequila there were about 10 cases. It is a genetic disorder characterized by a separation between the derme and the epiderme causing blistering and severe scaring of the skin.

 

epidermolysis bullosa

The two children I saw were brother and sister. From the disease their fingers and toe nails had fused together and their hands now looked like paws. They managed to grab the little gifts we were giving them by using their thumbs.

One can barely imagine the suffering they must endure by having their body image disfigured like this. These two children were of normal intelligence and very sweet. There is a complete web site on this rare disease at: http://www.debra.org/. Be careful if you are sensitive and do not visit this site as the images of people affected by this condition can be disturbing to say the least. There is some reasearch being done in the genetic fields and bone marrow transplant have shown some success.

I must admit that I got tears in my eyes when I saw a beautiful 6 month old baby on the second mission day who had the disease and her hands were starting to close.

Baby with rare skin disease

  The other days of missions went by pretty fast.

On the third night, I needed to set my bed outside as I had not slept in three days. I set-up my bed on a covered place and slept like a baby!

A good night

 During a mission, it’s not all work and no play and we easily enjoy a good laugh after a day’s work.

Dr Kroll (pretending to cry), me Dr Wong and Dr Celeste Braden

Bathing in falls during the off day

Francisco Perez singing with his extended family

Dr Jeff telling a joke to Dr Steve!

Mariachi on the last night

Michelle Braden

Michelle Braden who has been participating on medical missions for a while is a teacher. She asked her young students to donate whatever toys they did not use. She got a humongous box filled with toys, many still in their original wrappers. The children from Mexico were very grateful to get those little gifts.

I could go on forever because there are always so many great experiences in any given mission and I always receive more than I give.

I want to leave you with this untouched picture of a 17 year old who has a severe heart malformation and did not get surgery or medication yet. This potentially deadly situation astouned us. When we asked her why she did not have corrective surgery yet, she answered that the doctors told her to wait. She said she walks slowly and gets around. The blue on her lips is from lack of oxygen not make-up. In our society, when babies are born with such a heart malformation, they are operated on within the first year of life.

Teenager with severe heart malformation