Since we were not able to go to Maloney for several months due to severe flooding it was a great blessing to start going again regularly on Wednesdays.  The word is out and this week we saw more patients then we have ever seen in the past.

The day started bad, my first patient was an 18 day old that had been sick for a long time. The infant was malnourished and very lethargic. The skin was grayish in color and I knew the infant would probably only live a few more hours but we tried to see if we could help turn things around and I know there is always hope for God can do anything. Sadly, the infant died after about two hours. When I first saw the infant I hated seeing him for I knew all the organ systems of the body were already shutting down. They say in trauma cases there is the golden hour where if you can catch the person in the early stages of shock and get IV’s and all going before the systems start shutting down you have a good chance of survival. This child had long passed that golden hour. It is heartbreaking to see a little one die and listen to the mother’s cry.  We thank God for Pastor Santino who was able to step in and minister the love of Jesus to this family and share the hope we have in our Savior.

During the next 6 hours the clinical officer Sharon, myself, a hard working team of Community Health Workers and a missionary nurse from Texas named Amy saw over 250 patients. I love seeing the patients in the early stages of malaria when they respond so well to therapy. We saw many children with high temps from malaria and Pneumonia  and many bootie shots were given to get things turned around fast.

We headed back to Tonj about 6:30 PM and had to push the LandCruiser to get it started. On the way home the CHWs were in good spirits laughing and jabbering all the way home yelling boom- boom  every time we hit a bump and it is almost impossible not to hit a bump for in some places the whole road is one big bump.

One reason I believe the CHWs are so chipper on the ride home is because they are exhausted to the point of giddiness and they are proud of the amount of good we are able to do on the days we go to Maloney.  They laugh and giggle and tell me that my sons (boys) are hungry (no time to stop for lunch) and need some bread and they enjoy eating their peanut butter sandwiches.

Pray for Maloney and the continued outreach there to bless that community.

In His Love

Tom