On our January trip Kairos ministries brought First Presbyterian church from Lewisburg, PA to work on the mountain. Dr. Mark Speak and a full medical team saw hundreds of patients up on the mountain. This group has made many trips to Camotan over the past several years with Kairos ministries and was comprised of a mixture of both veteran and new, eager volunteers. They worked in all three mountain villages (Marimba, Tierra Blanca and Chiotan) that are closest to Camotan.
Dr. Mark Speak examining a patient
Dr. Steve Stahl and Dr. Jon Eichhorn from Denver also joined and served as providers–taking turns down in Camotan Clinic with Dr. Joel Strohecker and up in the mountains with the group.
Dr. Eichhorn examining a patient
Dr. Steve Stahl examining an infant
And as alluded to in the past, we were very excited to start collaborating with Saving Mothers–a nonprofit organization dedicated to eradicating preventable maternal deaths and birth related complications in low resource settings. Jessica Oliveras and her team of midwives (called comedronas in Guatemala) visited all the mountain villages above Camotan and saw over 70 pregnant mothers in these villages (these “villages” are actually just a collection of huts and are called aldeas).
Here is Jessica (black shirt 2nd from left, standing) working with her team of comedronas (standing on the R) and Sara Lever (medical student in the US serving as an intern currently for Saving Mothers-green shirt in the middle).
Emma Heid and Nichole St. Germain, RN with the children in Tierra Blanca
Here is the group walking up to one of the aldeas above Camotan…
Our nurse in the clinic, Joselyn will be assisting and running (along with our secretary Ana) with the day to day implementation of Saving Mothers into our daily clinic care.
We were also very excited to start using our new ultrasound machine!
If you are interested in the work Kairos ministries is doing, check out their Facebook page (under Kairos ministry) or their website: kairosguatemala.com.
Thanks for reading!