This trip is one of the most exciting I have
had in a long time in terms of shear talent that I have brought with me! The only disappointment (and those who know
me well know it’s kind of a big one in a lot of ways) is that there are no
students or residents here with us this time, but I’ve fully embraced the fun
of putting myself in to the role of “learner” or student this week, and I look
forward to gleaning what I can from Drs. Sylvia Botros and Hale Stephenson in
the operating room. Pretty sure that is
going to be amazing.
So Sylvia Botros is an actual
Urogynecologist—for those of you who don’t speak medicalese, that basically
means she is actually trained and qualified and specializes in doing what we
mostly do down here, which is prolapse and incontinence surgeries. These surgeries are definitely a stretch of
my own skills, and God and hopefully the patients know that I do the best that
I can—but I can’t even begin to express how excited I am to see how someone
with her skill set would handle these in this environment. Not only will the patients on this trip
benefit, but all of the future patients that I operate on. Literally.
All of them.
Sylvia is also another great example of how
God is always working behind the scenes on these trips in ways that I just
never even know about. She was a fourth
year resident when I was a first year at LBJ in Houston “back in the day”, and
we really didn’t know each other well.
If any of you readers have ever benefitted from my “30,000 foot view” of
urogynecology talk, it’s actually pretty much stolen from an informal teaching
session from her in the parking lot of the hospital the day before our
in-service exam that year we worked together.
We ran back in to each other at an APGO meeting a couple of meetings ago,
and she is one of the probably 35 to 50 people a year that expresses interest
in going with me on these trips. I email
the dates out and generally maybe three or four actually end up going. Obviously, it was a sweet and pleasant surprise
to me when she let me know a few months ago that she was on board for this
trip! I really look forward to getting
to know her better and hearing more about her two kids and family life in
Chicago.
Hale Stephenson has been down once before,
some of you will recall, with his oldest daughter Elizabeth. He is a very highly respected vaginal surgeon
in Greenville and works with one of the private groups in town. We had a great trip, and apparently the
middle daughter, Anna, has been asking when it’s her turn ever since they got
home! She is in undergrad at Carolina,
and apparently now it’s her turn. They
are delayed for a day—at least we hope it’s only a day!—to get a medical test
done and be sure she is fit to travel, so please pray for clear tests and safe
travels for them to join us tomorrow.
For the new readers, I am Heidi Bell, and
I’ve been doing these trips quarterly since 2008 when I joined faculty at East
Carolina University medical school as a general OB/GYN after living in
Guatemala for two years as a medical missionary after residency in Texas. My husband Matt and I were newlyweds when we
moved there together and a large part of our hearts belongs to the people and
the country of Guatemala. Our son Isaac was
born here in 2007. His little sister
Micah followed here in North Carolina in 2011.
We attend Integrity Church in Greenville, NC, and have also been
strongly blessed and supported by St. Luke’s Lutheran Church in Temperance,
Michigan where Matt’s parents are members.
Agape in Action and New Beginnings Resources in Porter, Texas, continue to
help with 501(c)3 tax paperwork as well as significant financial support for
the patients that we operate on that can’t afford their surgeries—check them
out at nbri.net and agapeinaction.org --We
have been amazed for years now by the continued outpouring of support for these
trips both in prayer and donations of unused medications or expired/unused
medical supplies. Keep those prayers
coming up and supplies coming in please!
UPDATE NOW BEFORE BED AND URGENT PRAYER
REQUEST:
1.
Hale and Anna are on track to be here tomorrow afternoon! YAY!
All smooth sailing with that so far.
2. At
the hospital this afternoon when we stopped by “just to pick up the apartment
key”, there was a patient waiting for us.
She looked pretty sick so we agreed to go ahead and set up the clinic
early—there was a note from Leslie Ficker saying that she is 37, has been told
she has a mass in her abdomen that needs surgery, and her abdomen is now full
of fluid (which is often a bad sign of late stage ovarian cancer!) After examining her, ovarian cancer—despite her
age—is still at the top of our list for differential diagnosis, and the plan is
to pray about her individually tonight, together in the morning, have Dr.
Stephenson look at her with us tomorrow afternoon, and get together as a team
to prayerfully decide how we can help.
The problem with operating is that we don’t have a way here to follow
salt/electrolyte balances in the blood, which tend to occur with large fluid
shifts with removal of the fluid in her belly.
Scary at best, very unlikely to do much more than buy her some time and
let her know that we really did want to help and give her a definite diagnosis
to take to the cancer hospital that she can’t really afford much treatment
at. Her husband is working down at the
coast cutting sugarcane for the season right now, so her father and son brought
her in. She is quite debilitated. Please pray for Isabella, the mother of eight
(the youngest of whom is ten months old!) and for wisdom for our team this week
especially! We will try to get a picture of her up tomorrow...
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