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| From left to right--Terry, Ethan and Fundi Watson working on the goat house |
Wednesday, June 12, 2019
News from Terry in Berega
Kristen, Tisho, Ethan, Lucas (Tisho’s cousin), and Terry left Morogoro to inspect four goats as prospects for the Berega Infants home Dairy Herd. They drove up a narrow and winding mountain road that eventually turned into a foot path. As they crested the mountain, they had a wonderful view of Morogoro behind them and a beautiful mountain village before them. Picking up a local guide, they went further down the foot path until they could no longer continue by vehicle. Disembarking, the walked the final kilometer on foot. They came to the farm of a farmer who had received crossbred dairy goats and cattle from Heifer Project many years before. His goat and cattle had multiplied and he was now in the position of being able to sell a few. Two of his goats had potential and Tisho started the bargaining process while Kristen, Ethan, and Terry inspected the dairy cattle. Ultimately, it was decided to purchase the better of the two goats and a one-year-old heifer from his best cow. The beginnings of the Berega Dairy Herd. Thanks be to God.
Work Begins....And Continues
Begins…
While Doug, Cindy, Sheila and Laura joined the Mazimbu staff
for morning meeting, the rest of the team met with our seven translators to
discuss expectations and goals. All but one of the translators have worked with
us in past years so their prior experience helped as they began their work with
us.
The hospital is shaped like an inverted “U” with Mazimbu
reception on the west end of the “U”. A table was set up on the east end of the
“U” for us, which became our own reception area. Pati’s job is to register
patients coming for our help, working with one of our experienced translators,
Epsilon. Some initial screening is done to look for people that might need a
surgical resolution for their problem. There are many more non-surgical
patients that are hoping that the US doctors can cure their ills and one of the
Mazimbu doctors, Dr Richard, who is working with us as one of our team doctors,
sees those patients.
After reception, the patient is shown through to our next
station, triage, where Laura or Sheila work with their translators, Sara and
Margret, to take the patient’s history and physical. One of the challenges of
the triage station is weeding out the one real reason why the patient
wants to see the doctor; most patients have a very long list of problems. Laura
and Sheila make the decision on whether to send the patient to see Doug or Dr.
Richard. Anna and Bethany work with the triage desk and once the patient is
done there, one of them will walk with the patient to take them to sit on a
bench outside of the office of the doctor they will be seeing.
Meggan works as the helper in Dougs office, managing the
flow of patients and generally helping to facilitate and communicate with the
rest of the team. Doug, working with his translator, Denis, makes the final
decision on whether surgery is the best course of treatment. If that is the
route to be taken, labs will be ordered which are processed by the lab on
premises. The patient waits for the results and once those are reviewed and
approved, the patient is added to our surgery schedule. By the end our first
day, six procedures were scheduled and that number will continue to grow each
day.
If surgery is not indicated, they will likely be given
medicine to help their condition. Doug has been on this team many times and
knows what medicines he is likely to need; those meds are part of our medical
gear so most of our patients visit with Glennis and Eileen, who are working our
pharmacy. Samwel, who first worked with us last year, stays close to help
Glennis and Eileen when they need to explain the meds to our patients.
Dr. Richard is, of course, able to work without translation,
but our newest translator, Obale, has been managing the patient flow outside of
Dr. Richards exam room.
Nancy is circulating throughout all of the stations, helping
wherever there is a need and spreading goodwill with all of our patients.
It is a point of humor on the team that we have two Chris’
with us. Chris Buzzelli, is a scrub tech and his job is to assist Doug in his
surgeries. Chris Pope is a retired general contractor and is working as a fundi
(fixer) with Lance. The humor comes from their names. Chris Buzzelli has become
“tall Chris” and Chris Pope has become “short Chris.” Refer to the picture to
see why we are so amused. Kishumu, working with us for the third year, helps
the fundis as they hunt through Morogoro for unique parts or for team
supplies that need to be purchased each day.
And finally, Cindy is available for the whole team and for
the Mazimbu staff, answering questions and helping where needed.
And Continues…
Our second day working with patients was a bit busier than the
first. We knew that word of mouth would have spread overnight, so we enlisted
the help of the night guard to record the names of the first 50 patients
arriving to get in our queue. So when our daladala arrived, our patients
were waiting—all 50 plus a few hopeful extras.
Our procedures worked well and facilitated our work so all patients
were seen as promised. This is a huge improvement over past years when it was
mid afternoon before we finally made the decision on the # of remaining patients
who could be seen, turning away many many people who had waited all day hoping
to make it into our queue.
Doug and Tall Chris will be very busy with surgery starting
tomorrow. We have 4 procedures scheduled for each day, so our schedule will
likely be completely full by the end of our day tomorrow.
Monday, June 10, 2019
Greetings and Gizmos
A bright cool morning dawned as the team had a leisurely start
to our day. After our communal breakfast, we did a bit of organizing and then
our driver arrived in a daladala, which is a very common mass transit vehicle
here, like an older Toyota minivan. Daladalas hold about 10 people
comfortably, so our group of 15 was very friendly with each other.
Bishop Mameo met us at the diocese office where we were
formally greeted and welcomed. Newcomers to the team were introduced and we all
enjoyed our visit, exchanging good hearted humor about the extremes in weather
between our two countries. Bishop Mameo is studying for his doctorate in
divinity through Luther seminary in St. Paul, Minnesota and was most recently
in the US in February.
Our families may have noticed a bit of deafening silence
from us since we arrived because we have not had access to internet or phones.
Both tech problems were on the list today, along with moving all of our medical
gear to Mazimbu. One of our translators, Kishumu, has already been working with
us and was invaluable in helping with our communication and his familiarity
with Morogoro meant he was able to tell us just where to go.
Communication has not been our only tech problem… until
today we had been unsuccessful in exchanging money. Oddly enough, every bureau
de change that we stopped at, beginning with the airport in Dar es Salaam, was
closed or not functioning. We learned today that nationwide all of the exchanges
are closed pending an investigation. That left the local bank as our only
option for changing money. When our troop entered the lobby, it prompted an
excess of courtesy so what we thought was a set of routine transactions ended
up taking more than an hour and a half!
After high finance, lunch was the order of business and the
team joined Tisho and Kristen at Ricky’s, one of our favorite restaurants.
Tisho and Kristen are a married couple that are missionaries with The Mission
Society and are directors of Berega infants home. Berega is about two hours
away from Morogoro in a very rural area and the home is working to acquire
livestock to become self-sufficient. Terry is a goat expert and his role on the
team is to go with Tisho and Kristen and facilitate the purchase of several
nanny goats. So we said goodbye to him after lunch and will meet up with him
again this weekend.
By now, the day was waning, so Pati went with Kishumu to
solve internet and phone issues, while the rest of the team went back to LJS to
gather up our medical bags. We met at Mazimbu after 4 and again renewed our
friendship with the doctors and staff at the hospital.
After dinner, more prep was done for the following day. Dr.
Doug, Cindy, Sheila and Laura will join the Mazimbu staff at morning meeting
while the rest of the team has our first organizational meeting with our
translators.
Stay tuned for new of our first day after Tuesday is done!
Sunday, June 9, 2019
We have arrived!
Welcome to Tanzania!
The Tanzania surgical mission trip began Friday mid-morning
when all 15 of us joined together at Dallas-Fort Worth airport for the flight
to Dar es Salaam. The first hop was 14 ½ hours with a plane change in Dubai,
UAE. Then just a short 5 hours down to Dar es Salaam. Our trip was long but
uneventful…all 30 of our checked bags arrived intact. The plane from Dubai was
almost empty, which made it easier to sail through customs.
It was only a bit before 10 pm when we were checked into our
rooms at a local hostel, the Catholic Guest house. The morning sun revealed the
beauty around us, from lush greenery to vivid local flowers. A hot beverage was
in store, after which we climbed onto our bus for the short ride to church.
Worship in Dar es Salaam was with a Lutheran congregation at
the Azania Front. Our chosen service is an English language service and you
could see the smiles on the team as we joined our Tanzanian brothers and
sisters in song.
A brief overview of our team:
Cindy Pennie, nurse and team leader, Stillwater, OK
Doug Treptow, general surgeon, Rogers, Ar
Glennis Treptow, helper, Rogers, Ar
Pati Murdock, 2nd team leader, Rogers, AR
Lance & Eileen Miller, Hot Springs Village, Ar
Terry Gipson, goat expert, Stillwater, Ok
Chris Pope, Stillwater, Ok
Anna Long, helper, Stillwater, Ok
Bethany and Megan Pierce, helpers, Trinidad, Co
Nancy Bean, helper, Weatherford, Tx
Sheila Weyenberg, RN, Norman, OK
Laura Brown, RN, Rogers, AR
Chris Buzzelli, Rogers, AR
As this blog is written, we are just finishing up a fabulous
brunch at the Southern Sun and will shortly begin the final leg of our trip up
to Morogoro, which will take about 5 hours.
We will post our updates ever day or two, so stay tuned. And
we love comments!
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