Kenya, April 13-23
Kisumu City, and the village of Atemo

From April 13th to 23rd a team of 8 volunteers and 2 staff traveled to Western Kenya to serve targeted communities with a series of medical clinics. The team comprised of two physicians of emergency medicine, three nurses, a physical and musical therapist, and two lay people. The team had two LCMS WR-HC staff team leaders; Jacob Fiene, Manager of Medical Resources, and Scarlet Holcombe PharmD and coordinator of special projects. The team hired the help of three Kenyan nurse practitioners during each of the clinics.

In all the team held a total of 4 clinics and treated a total of 1172 patients with a record breaking 454 patients on our final day. We held two clinics in the newly opened Kisumu Lutheran Medical Center and two clinics in the soon to be revamped Atemo Medical Clinic. In the first site we served a somewhat urban population, in the second a predominantly rural population.

Each Mercy Medical Team experience is different, but this one was very special. Not only did we have the opportunity to work alongside national health workers and offer our services to the sick and vulnerable, we were able to tangibly save the lives of at least three people in very desperate situations.

During a clinic in the village of Atemo, Dr. Mana Kasongo was approached by the staff nurse of the Atemo Maternity Ward. The nurse asked Dr. Kasongo if she was capable of delivering a baby. Somewhat excited at the prospect, Dr. Kasongo hurried next door. After a quarter hour of deliberation, however, it was discovered that the young woman had been in labor for over 16 hours and was now in danger of loosing the life of her baby as well as her own life. Dr. Kasongo gently yet sternly explained the urgency of the situation. It seemed the family of the young woman had given up hope, knowing there would be no way to pay for her admittance to a hospital. After making the severity of the situation clear to the girl’s family, Dr. Kasongo and Rev. David Chuchu were able to rush the young woman to the nearby Matata Hospital in Oyugis where she received emergency surgery. Both mother and daughter are now healthy. The baby was named Mana, after Dr. Kasongo.

Before Dr. Kasongo had left for Kenya she was approached by a virtual stranger who overheard her MMT plans while in a hair salon. After a few questions the woman handed Dr. Kasongo a check written out to LCMS World Relief and Human Care saying that she felt led to donate something to this cause. The amount given in that check was precisely enough to cover the expenses of this emergency operation.

The following day Dr. Alfred Woodard saw another case in need of immediate action. A child named Eric came into his exam room along with his brother and a neighbor. Both Erik and his brother are orphans living with their grandmother, both were malnourished. Erik, however, was extremely sick. Dr. Woodard had never seen a case such as his, but he was immediately able to identify the child’s obvious edema and further diagnose him with Nephrotic Nephritic Syndrome. Dr. Woodard took immediate action to get the boy re-hydrated and to get some protein in his diet. Woodard and his wife Ella, then bought Eric’s family three hens to provide him with egg whites to help him recover, while another MMT volunteer agreed to sponsor his education.

Eric’s case was very severe. He has been transferred to a hospital in Kisumu where he is continuing his recovery.

These stories highlight the biggest difficulties faced by short term medical volunteers traveling to developing nations. We can all get passed the unfamiliar foods, the bumpy roads, and the difference in language. It is the complete divergence in the circumstances of life that really separates volunteers from those who they seek to serve during these trips. In the United States when there is a real medical emergency we do what needs to be done immediately. If someone is about to die but cannot pay, this person ends up getting treatment and the cost gets absorbed somewhere.

In places like the Kenyan countryside people are much more inclined to accept their perceived fate. For many people the cost of simply getting transport to a sanitary health facility is outside of their reach. This, combined with the devastating effects of HIV and other diseases, has shaped the reality of life and death for these people. Understanding the limitations they face can be difficult for volunteers to understand. It may not be possible for someone to receive follow up care, or to be referred, or pay for tests, or even brush their teeth twice a day. It becomes difficult to balance what is possible with what is needed according to our own standards.

I’ll use the pregnant woman and here family as an example. To outside medical professionals it was clear that the girl and her child were going to die without surgery. To the family it was clear that the girl and her child might die if the girl didn’t give birth soon. It may have appeared as though the family of the pregnant girl was somewhat apathetic towards the severity of her situation. They never pleaded with us to take their daughter in. They were not exactly frantic. When told that their daughter needed to go to the hospital the just looked at each other as if to say, “yeah, but how?” It was not until the girl had been operated on and she and her child were both living that the families’ tears began to flow and their love for their child and gratitude towards us was expressed, and believe me they were very grateful.

While experiences such as these present great challenge to the group and often lead to frustration, they inevitably bring the group together as it becomes clear that this is no longer just a process and giving people ibuprofen and lollypops, we are actually here to save lives.

As we sat together at the Serena Hotel overlooking the Masai Mara game preserve (our little end of trip R&R treat), the group openly shared their impressions. Although the MMT program exists to serve the sick and help our partner churches abroad build their capacity, it was clear that we were all taking something home with us; a kind of education that you cannot get from textbooks or medical schools. These trips offer a new perspective on life and health in the world, and help to restore the empathy that first drives individuals to seek out a medical career.