USA

It's 10:30 am Saturday and I'm sitting at the Atlanta airport. Alicia, Claire and I got bumped to the next flight because I had lost my passport during the customs check in. I found it, an actually Delta was great, they had over booked the flight in the first place, so we got a $200 credit each to take the next flight! All the students and Tony made it the flight and will still have a long bus trip to Orono in the snow!

Our closing of our trip didn't lack any attention. One of the student's was very dehydrated from gastroenteritis, and fortunately Dr Lance Evans lent us some IV supplies and fluids. So we had a portable "hospital" on the bus and then in the hostel in QUITO. Fortunately the student did respond well and is much better at this point.

As it comes to the end of this mission, there is so much to reflect on. I still have a lot of work in calculating out the statistics of infant mortality and such... and then of course the list of patients that need referrals. We met a lot of young children with murmurs. Hopefully I can get that all together as soon as possible!

One of my friends Kathy is already headed for Boston to pick us up and I feel bad that she will have to wait for our delay. We hear that the snow storm in NH is bad.

It's nice to be back in the USA and we're looking forward to reuniting with our family and friends. But with out a doubt our new friends in Ecuador will remain in our thoughts and heart for a very long time. In addition to the "patients" we made new friends with some of the foriegn interpretors we worked with: Gabe, Sarah, Sarah, Mark, Marciel and Calindi - hopefully we will all stay in touch through the internet and future endeavors.

I'll post pictures in the next few days
Adios
Terry

quito

Today Nick, Sarah G, Lance, and I went to Tierra Nueva to look into doing June's mission there. It a hospital especially for the poor. This would give MEDLIFE an opportunity to get involved - or at least witness the urban poor vs the mountainess indigenous. The meeting went well, and looks good for all the arrangements.
Gabe and Sarah toured us around their foundation: cenit - this is a great foundation teaching young students, as well as older woman - marketable skills.
We are currently just wrapping up our shopping in Quito, then a good meal, then a LONG TRIP HOME!!
Hope the snow falling in New England doesn't delay our return much!!
Terry

PS we brought 3 patients with us to Quito today, and they are all getting the needed treament!!

friday

I have a few minutes before we catch the bus to Quito. We had a busy day today. We saw 60 patients - all between the hours of 9:30 and 2:00. Mostly children, but about 10 pap smears too. The children in this village seemed more ill, with underweight, respiratory disease and diarhea. I think we treated more people today than all week!
We are bringing Sangudo, Tupac and Maria to Quito with us - to get specialty care. There are so many others that will need follow up -especially once the pap results come in.

Adios for now
Terry

rio colorado

The first really cold and wet day we´ve had. We were back up at high altitude -close to Chimborazo. These people live above tree line and live very hard lives. They have recently been introduced to greenhouse agriculture by some well meaning organizations, and this -at least- has offered them a better oppportunity to have sustainable crops.
We saw lots of free roaming alpaca and llama, they are really beautiful.
We saw Sengundo, one of the little boys from last years mission, who needs heart surgery. He and one of his parents will travel to Quito with us on Friday to have a follow up visit with the cardiac surgeons. Tupac, the other young boy w/murmur has appointment in Quito too, but fortunately he doesn´t need surgery.
We were entertained by the local men playing volleyball. They are really quite good, but given the weather conditions it turned out to be more of a mud game.
As we wind down, we are all looking forward to hot showers, fast food, our own beds and reuniting with our family and friends!
I may not get a chance to write tomorrow, because we will be having clinic most of the day, then pack and wind up things in Riobamba and then jump on a bus to Quito!
Adios for now
Terry

pictures from Saturday in Banos as promised

PAIGE, SHANON, AIMEE IN BANOS
SHANON, TIM, PAIGE IN BANOS

LAURA, KERRY, ALICIA, ROUL, TERRY, JESSE, CLAIRE AT THE WATERFALL
THE BLACK CLOUD IS ASH COMING FROM THE VALCANO

THE END OF THE RAINBOW IN BANOS ALICIA, JESS, KERRY AND LAURA AT THE WATERFALL

AN ECUADORIAN BEETLE!

CRAIG, TIM AND TONY IN BANOS

Monday at Cebedas

Last night some of us accompanied Martha (our host) to evening mass. Of course it was in spanish, but otherwise similar to our catholic services. The church was beautiful inside.

Today we saw 80 patients in Cebedas and will return there tomorrow. One of Alicia´s first patient was a women with a fractured forearm. the fracture was probably 2 weeks old and she tried to make a brace with ace and a branch. She was so resourceful.
I saw an 18 month old that couldn´t walk yet. Also many older patients with significant arthritis. They live such hard lives. When we suggest resting for a week to let a tendonitis ¨heal¨they simply can´t comprehend the idea of not working.
Nick met up with the team and joined us today. Talk about jumping into the fire from the fry pan. He just took 4 major exams last week, and his only week off he comes to Ecuador!
All of the students are really giving their best, despite the fact that most of them are fighting off a cough and some ¨travelers¨GI distress. There is not a whiner in the group.

Last night after dinner, I asked the students to summarize their experiences from the previous week for Nick. They were so insightful and compasionate. I feel very privileged to be working with them.

Tony has been a rock keeping us saine when needed, and helping us laugh when needed.

Anyways... back to the mission. As in many days past, the fed us lunch. It was the best fried chicken and french fries Í´ve had in a long time.

We continue to focus on women´s health and hope tomorrow will be a younger group.

well bye for now
more tomorrow
I´ll try to send pictures tomorrow
Terry

Baños

Today was a great day! Started a little sad, with goodbyes to Juan and Sarah D. They are heading back to the states. Gabe (American volunteer here in Ecuador) and his friend Laura (from Cuba) joined us on our adventure to Baños. We checked out the ¨baths¨ - they were really more like public pools that are fed with the warm water that comes down from the volcano. We had a nice lunch. Then we split up for a while. One group stayed in the main city -shopping and exploring. The rest of us took the van up the road about 20 minutes and hiked down to an incredible waterfall. It was very tropical, not far from the Amazon.
Just as we were leaving Baños the volcano began ¨belching¨. We got some great views and pictures. We also saw a beautiful rainbow. I will download the pictures tomorrow.

The drive back to Riobamba we were all a little over tired and silly. Playing a game of what would you rather be.... or .... They were coming up with some rather silly options, but it was a nice release for everyone to just laugh and giggle.

Nick arrives tomorrow. It will be a day of rest. Some of us are going to go with Martha, our host, to a Catholic mass... we still are not clear if it will be in Spanish or Latin.

some pictures are up!

Hi guys
I managed to post a few pictures. I interjected them into yesterdays´s post. Check it out! I´ll have more time over the next 2 days to put more pictures on. (it literally takes 3 minutes per picture)
Everyone is well, we all have a bit of congestion and sore throats, but that´s more likely the climate and the dust than real illness, because it´s not slowing any of us down.
Juan and Sarah leave today to go back to Maine and study for MCATs and work- we will MISS them greatly. Nick (our founder) will arrive tomorrow....
Off to Banos for a little R&R

Adios
Terry

getting caught up on our trip

OK, so I’m sitting at Cruz de Arenal waiting for our patients to arrive. It is Day 5 of our missions. Unfortunately, after spending over an hour writing on the computer last night – the computer crashed and all was lost. So today I’m writing on my laptop and hope to just download from here.

Day 3 LICTO
We set up clinic in a monastery. We saw at least 70 people at least 25 were female exams. This mission we are fortunate enough to have 2 doctors! Alicia has been a god-send to our group.
The students are doing a great job. They rotate through the different stations: height and weight, blood pressure and temp, one student w/each doctor, they dispense the meds from the farmacia (pharmacy), they brush teeth and give fluoride treatments, and assist the dentist when he is with us.
The students witnessed a seizure today. One of our patients with known seizure disorder, seized at the clinic. She’s on anti-seizure medicine, but the mother wasn’t sure when her last blood levels were drawn. Also her mother tells us that her daughter needs surgery – a shunt- to move fluid off the brain, but they have no money for the surgery. A lot of women have expressed interest in “family planning”. One woman, when asked if she wanted anymore children, said very solemnly “No, in this life there is no rest”. She was 28 yr old w/5children. We also saw a lot of arthritis in the older population due to their hard lives.

THE STUDENT TEAM:
FROM LEFT TO RIGHT BACK: CRAIG, TIM, JUAN, PAIGE AND KERRY
FRONT : JESS, AIMEE, SHANON, SARAH

This day seemed to touch each of us differently. But there was a theme of questioning our goals and what we can accomplish. Obviously a 2 week mission, spending only a day at a time – we can’t do a lot of “real” medicine. It often feels like band-aiding the issues. But fortunately we have local support (Blanca a previous patient and now a health promoter for MEDLIFE). Blanca has been honest with us about how the indigenous people receive us, and for the most part they are grateful for the attention. When their day to day life is working to gather food and develop safe shelter, it means a lot for a medical team to travel to them and validate their human rights, especially the right to access healthcare. It makes our long term goal of building a clinic to serve them year round - more pressing than ever!

DAY 4 CALSHI
This day’s visit we had Mercedes (an Ecuadorian doctor) helping ½ a day. Alicia made a house call on a patient who was too ill to come to the clinic.






These people were incredibly gracious and generous. They served us lunch: cuy (pronounced KWEE) – in American that would be guinea pig. Almost all the team tried it. Marcial (one of our interpreters) got the head!
Most of the patients blamed the volcano ash for most of their ailments.
One patient who suffers from severe degenerative joint disease – in obvious pain. When asked about his hip, he stated it used to be so bad, he saw a doctor in town that said he needed a hip replacement, but his bones were too thin for the surgery. Then he goes on to explain that a cousin contacted an old trusted doctor (telepathically, as he was dead). The doctor changed part of the hip bone to flesh, so he no longer experiences bone against bone and then the pain is significantly better.
Another pregnant woman was asked when her baby was due, and she replied: If the baby is a girl she will come in May, if the baby is a boy, he will come in June.
DAY 5 CRUZ DE ARENAL

Today’s mission took us the highest point yet. We passed Chimbarazo. We caught a glimpse of it before it snuck behind the clouds.
There was a communication break down, and the people of this village thought we were only examining children. We saw about 50 people, but about 80% were children. They were all very small for their age, only one or two looked significantly malnourished.
Below are the names of a few patients who were awing my laptop. So I asked them to type their names, and I would store it and never forget them. They smiled, and each one (some 7yr, some in their 40s) typed in their names, and then asked me when we will be back!
Cecilia
Angel
Segundo
Segundo
BlancaAnabel

Well - all the typing on my laptop was transferrable to the blog - but still fighting to get the pictures on board. hopefully tomorrow- I´m very sorrow- I´m sure you would all love the album of pictures we are collecting but technology has a mind of its own.

We are going to Banos tomorrow ! Yeah a day off!
Adios
Terry

Mission Day 4

I am just writing to let you all know - we are well. Working very hard, but trying to make a difference. The people are so grateful, and that makes it worth it.

I had just finished typing up a summary of yesterday and today, and began having troubles downloading pictures - then the connection went dead.

I had put an hour into editing that and it´s gone. It´s also past 10 and I must get to bed. so I´ll try again tomorrow with pictures as a priority!
Terry

Learning the language

Today was a beautiful sunny day, with a clear picture of the active volcano (seen from a very far and safe viewpoint).

We were joined today by many new volunteers: Sarah G, Marcos and sister, and Gabe. Their assistance with transalation has been invaluable. HUVSYAL brought along a few more people as well. Initially it seemed we were going to have more volunteers than we had the need for, but it turned out to be a very productive day. We saw about 65 people, and Dr Alicia and I were head to head on our numbers of patience seen. But she´s in the lead!

A few interesting comments were are becoming accustom to are:

I have a sadness headache, the cold settled in me and caused me my ailments.

In addition to offering these indigenous people a general health screening and education, we took the time to learn more about their communities health issues - for example how many babies die before the age 5 (most likely from treatable illness)

CHILDCARE SERVICES!!

GIVE US YOUR MOUTH AND WE´LL GIVE YOU SMILE!

The flouride team, and the dentist!

SMILES ARE FREE AND UNIVERSAL

NOT TO MENTION SMILES ARE JUST GOOD

MEDICINE.... from our pharmacia

Day 1

The loading and packing for today´s mission went surprisingly well this morning. It is also helpful that HUVSYAL now has a pick up truck for more of the awkward pieces of gear.

The village was so steep on the mountain that our van could not navigate the last mile, so we were shuttled in the HUVSYAL truck.

For our first day, I thought it went well. Alicia jumped right in an saw a ton of patients, probably about 55 of the 65 total. I did 23 female exams. It went fairly smooth, because the health promoters had prepared the community for our visit.

Language, as always, was a great barrier, but we were fortunate enough to have 2 young students, Colinda and Marcelle helping out and they are great interpreters.

Over dinner tonight, Jessica and Shannon commented about how they were actually able to communicate with some of the curious indigenous people. They used their basic spanish, drawing on paper and a lot of body language. This is a great experience for the students to narrow the cultural gaps.

My sister, Claire, worked as a strong link in the team, supervised by Sarah D. (VP of UMAINE´s club). In comparison to last years first day, we were so far ahead in terms of organization. SarahD. and Juan are really demonstrating their strong leadership skills.

It was pretty dark by the time we actually got onthe road back to Sierra Nevada. In part was the one car road up the hill was blocked by a truck stuck in the mud. While waiting for the van, we got to see a woman bringing her sheep in from the fields.

on a closing note, for last year´s MEDLIFErs. Thomasa had 2 babinos!

Riobamba

Well we made it to Riobamba. It was a very LONG trip. The students that started in Maine got in a Van around 3:30. We all met up in Boston and headed to Quito via Atlanta. There was a delay in Boston, so we didn´t have much time in Atlanta but to run to the next plane. When we arrived in Quito it was close to 11pm then onto a bus for a 4 hour drive that was interupted by a brief stop to Dr Lance Evans WALDOS Clinic. It is a work in progress, but it is coming together beautifully! Martha, our host, greeted us at about 3am and we all passed out! We were also joined by 3 new friends that work w/a nonprofit out of Quito. Blanca (see our last year´s blog, she was the patient with thyroid cancer) has joined us for the next two weeks with her little girl!



Sunday - we got up for 10am and met w/Jonathan, a local physician, and Blanca (our former patient and newest patient advocate). We are working hard to come together and achieve HUVSYAL´s goals as well as accomplish MEDLIFE´s goals. Sarah, Mario and Gabe from Quito spent the day with us. It was awesome sharing stories and learning from each other.

After a delicious lunch by Martha we went to Guano (a small ¨leather¨town) for a little tourism.
Picture below is most of the group on the mountainside.




Then back to Martha´s for packing and organizing for tomorrow´s first village trip.
The group really worked like a team!
At supper we had Pizza and what would a pizza party be without a pizza eating contest-
Juan, Tim, and Craig ....... and the winner is CRAIG at 14 slices. Juan and Tim gave him a good fight by each eating 10 slices!

As I´m finishing this post, I had a minute to talk to Nick (our founder) who is studying excessively for his Medical School Midterms! We all sending him our ¨smart¨thoughts!!

Lots more to say tomorrow
Terry