In the evenings I’m entertaining myself by playing a suite of guitar pieces by Gaspar Sanz. Only one problem: the electricity kept going out. So I lit a candle and continued playing – probably just the same way he did in 1700!This morning I began be visiting hospital patients: a lady who’s husband beat […]
This is my 5th day as the solo doctor, and I’m thankful to find that the so far I’m keeping up. But I’ve had three patients die only since yesterday – die of disease that would have been easily treatable in Kansas City. The first was a 40-year man with “normal everyday” hepatitis. The
As I arrived at the Evangelical Med Center of Lubango today I was immediately summoned to the ER to see a child, Miguel, who’d just arrived. On first glance, the four-year old boy was swollen across his face – a sure sign of pellagra, a nutritional disease unknown in the US. But what startled
Today I’m in Lubango, Angola. If you look at a map of Africa, Angola is a nation in the southwest corner. I lived here for two years, working at a mission hospital and also doing mobile clinics. During these weeks I’m covering for Steve Foster, the Canadian doctor who runs the Evangelical Medical Center
The world of medical missions has changed dramatically since Mother Teresa left for India in 1929. Nevertheless, today some 3 billion people still have no access to even the most basic health necessities. One of these is Jose Santos, pictured here in Angola. As an infant he was never vaccinated against polio and tragically acquired