Medical mercy mission

TAMI HART | ARGUS OBSERVER Holy Rosary Medical Center's medical mission team receives a blessing at the HRMC Chapel Thursday. The 10-person medical team is headed to Saint Jude Hospital in the West Indies for a month-long stay on the tiny island of Saint Lucia.

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Larson experienced firsthand the conditions at Saint Jude's in 1998 when he and his wife Evie, a registered nurse, volunteered at the hospital. That was part of the reason Saint Jude's was chosen for the first mission site.

"Knowing we had limited time and we wanted to have some controls over this experience in terms of accessibility and safety, and we wanted to go some place that's familiar to us is why we're going to St Jude," Larson said. "It's also a part of the grant stipulation that we have some connection to the place that we're going."

The team is headed to the West Indies during the start of the hurricane and rainy season, and Larson said this is a time when few volunteers make it to the area.

Word will spread though, once the team makes it to Saint Jude's, and people will come from miles away to seek treatment.

"People will come for things that they've neglected or haven't had the opportunity to have treated because the hospital where they have doctors on staff don't have the specialties," Larson said. "People walk for miles and then stand outside the hospital waiting for treatment and if they can't be seen that day, they go back home and do it again the next day."

Medical problems in Saint Lucia are not much different than those found in developing countries, although there are unique diseases such as leprosy and schistosomiasis and parasitic infections are very prevalent, Larson said. Children and the elderly are very susceptible to diarrhea and dehydration as a result of unsanitary drinking water.

"The compelling motivation for the program is the reality that people living in impoverished countries have limited access to health care, and we have a moral obligation to do what we are able to help meet their basic needs," Mark Dalley, HRMC CEO said. "Another compelling reason is the transforming effect the program will have on Holy Rosary. It will enrich the soul of our organization by deepening our own realization of our mission, values and vocations through lived experiences with the poorest of the world's poor."

It is that dedication to the mission and values of HRMC that was a key component of selection for the mission team, Larson said.

"Everybody that applied was accepted," Larson said. "We've got an interdisciplinary group without trying."

Bobbie Turnipseed, a registered nurse for 25 years, said the time was right for her to take on this challenge.

"My kids are grown and I have always wanted to do the mission. On a personal basis, it's something I've wanted to do since I started nursing. I feel like now is the time I can make my contribution," Turnipseed said.

Diagnostic imaging technician Terri Vogt and her husband Mike Asplund also are a part of the team.

"I thought this was something great to do to be able to help other people. We volunteer in numerous things and this was just an extension of it. We hope to come back with a lot of new friends, new ideas and a feeling of self-satisfaction of helping others," Vogt said.

Larson said the team faces a number of challenges during their stay in Saint Lucia.

"Just being in a culture and surroundings that are unfamiliar to us adds a certain stress to it," he said.

For Turnipseed, her biggest challenge will be adapting to the way medicine is performed in the small hospital.

"Our critical care medicine here is so highly technical, to keep it simple and do simple clinical work is going to be a bit of a challenge for me because we have all this equipment and they don't. Learning how to do it their way is going to be the biggest challenge for me," Turnipseed said.

There are other challenges as well. The team will be housed in tight quarters, with very little privacy, and while that is a low-grade form of stress, it's a constant stress that is wearing, Larson said.

"We want very much to do our best for people, but in their way of doing things, so that's all a challenge. It's a good challenge and one you want to have and you come back the more enriched for it," he said.

Several medical supply vendors have donated items, including MedNow, which the team will be carrying in 13 extra large duffel bags.

Local hardware store Kinney Brothers and Keele True Value Hardware contributed a full set of power tools for the team's use while at Saint Jude and those tools will be left behind as a donation to the hospital.

"We will know we are making a difference one bandaged arm and one mended leg at a time," Larson said.