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Dr. Cindy
Hoover is a missionary and member of Bethany Covenant Church,
currently serving in Haiti after several years in Mexico. Here is one
of her
reports from Haiti:
...and
here is her Blog (offsite link):
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"August 27th.
Some random things from seeing kids in the clinic today:
It is really hard to put on powderless gloves when your hands are hot
and sweaty. After laughing at my attempts, the nurse finally showed me
the trick of shaking it out, holding wide the wrist and blowing into
it, and squeezing air down into the fingers (don’t try this if the
gloves need to be sterile ). It was still a bit of a challenge, but at
least my fingers were starting to get in the right slots.
Much of pediatrics is the same wherever you are. Kids get colds and
ear infections and mothers worry about kids. The main difference here
is that the moms aren’t all asking for the most expensive newest
antibiotic and amoxicillin still seems to work.Some things aren't the
same though. I have been surprised to find that most of the mothers
don't know the birth weight of their babies (even when born in the
hospital) and that the clinic workers also aren't very tuned in to
what babies weigh. They had one 2 month old weighing 28 pounds. Most
weights are rounded to the nearest kg (2.2 pounds)!
Power outages, while inconvenient to me while seeing patients must
really be annoying to the US surgeon here this week. There is no back
up generator at the hospital.
Unneeded suffering is disturbing wherever it happens. I saw what was
probably the saddest case of my career in pediatrics today. A totally
cachectic 2 year old girl was brought in by mom, who has one other at
home and one on the way. The child was normal till 6 months ago
according to mom, when she started to waste away. She was just a
skeleton with pale flesh (really noticeable in a Haitian child) and
horrible scaling rashes and a pitiful pleading look in her eyes. In
taking the history, I was asking mom about HIV history. She handed me
a paper to show that she was HIV negative, but somehow she had never
noticed and no one had ever told her that also on that slip was that
she was RPR positive -- indicating syphilis. This child requires more
lab work and more care than could be provided here, but very likely
has congenital syphilis and protein calorie malnutrition. This could
have been prevented! The positive is that there still is time for mom
to be treated and hopefully her current pregnancy will have a better
outcome. I thought of taking a photo of Julie, to include, but then
decided that she is indelibly etched in my mind, and a photo here
would not be respectful and caring of her dignity. Do please pray for
little Julie though.
It was a tiring day -- after mainly seeing the children of the staff
at the hospital, the word has gotten out that there is a pediatrician
here, and many are coming who have been in need of care for a while,
some in need of more care than I can provide here, and sadly at times,
more care than is to be found in all of Haiti at this point. Some
valuable programs disappeared with the earthquake and so a country
with poor health care coverage to begin with now has even more access
issues and holes in vital areas of care. Pray that the various
organizations working here can start to coordinate efforts and work
together to provide the needed services and care and that aid goes to
those who should be receiving it. Pray also that both Haitian and
expatriate professionals who see the various areas where their
expertise could make a difference will be willing to view this as an
opportunity for ministry and for giving back indirectly to all who
have made their current situation possible.
Thanks for continuing on this journey with me."
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Previously she served in Mexico. her service area
in Oaxaca included some of the poorer areas and least hospitable climate of
the country. Diseases such as dengue fever are well known
here. But she has quietly shown the people how, with God's
help, they can help themselves to have a healthier and better
life.
Soon after her arrival, she began
by training her hosts in proper drinking water quality and safety
measures to prevent the spread of water-borne infectious diseases
and parasites.
Working with local churches and
local authorities, she founded a program of health care screening
services. She trained volunteer villagers to teach basic hygiene,
perform health screening tests, and recognize and refer more
serious illnesses for treatment by government physicians.
This program was expanded when
schools of the area invited her volunteers to come provide their
first systematic health screening, vision screening and anemia
screening. Short term mission teams of health care
professionals from the USA have joined her in implanting this
effort.
Working with the women of one
village, Dr. Cindy used church-donated seed money and locally
pooled resources to help them start a community bank, which they
use to fund loans to improve local small businesses.
These loans help them to improve
their living conditions, learn financial responsibility and
decision making skills, and promote goal oriented saving.
Christians and non-Christians have worked side by side. The gospel
is heard at bank meetings. The bank has more than doubled in size
and is now the source to fund another bank in a neighboring
village. God multiplies his returns many fold.
Dr. Cindy's work preparing God's
fields continues. Please remember her and her villagers in
your prayers, and contact the office
if you wish to help her
mission.
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