COMMUNITY HEALTH
> Countering World Health Organization's Predictions
> Churches' Gifts Impact Community Health
> Nancy McGaughey on Her Way to Sudan
> Nurse Grads in Haiti Ready to Serve

Spring 2009  |  Volume 16  |  Issue 1

Rebuilding Haiti, One Nurse at A Time
Rev. Dr. Will Browne, Executive Director

From the Executive Director

     In the world of medical theory, community health and curative care are often set in opposition. We prefer to advocate for a holistic vision that works first to help communities be healthy and minimizes conditions promoting disease. Better to avoid an illness than to have to treat it later. But we are also advocates of compassion and passionate about provision of the best care possible for those for whom disease has not been avoided. We do not believe at MBF that it is ‘either - or’ but with God’s guidance and in God’s merciful grace it can and ought to be ‘both - and.’
     While traveling in Myanmar recently I saw much need for effective community health development. And I saw it being done well in ways that honored the leadership and choices of the people of the community served. When a kidney stone attacked me (how else can one describe that pain?) I was grateful for a Christian physician who helped me find a wonderful Buddhist doctor in a good clinical setting.

     As I teach the Gospel of Mark in Sunday School at the church my wife serves, I note that Jesus is both pulled to compassionate care and burdened by what it entails. We who care about medical mission in Christ’s name find no easier balance or simple answers. Life is complicated and hard. The societies in which we live give us both strength and entrap us in dysfunctional systems. We respond in Christ’s name and following his example seeking both to alleviate the need through community health - and to alleviate the pain through curative care.

--Will Browne

In Memoriam: Tom Stewart

     Tom Stewart, who some of you remember as an MBF Regional Director for nearly 20 years, died of a pulmonary embolism in October 2008. His wife reports that they were amazed to discover that Dr. Pai, the Korean emergency surgeon who attended Tom, was the son of a doctor who began his training at Chonju Medical Center in Korea. At the encouragement of PC(USA) missionary Dr. Ron Dietrick, Dr. Pai’s father came to the U.S. to complete medical school. Over time, all six of his children became physicians. Today, Dr. Pai and his wife participate in short term mission trips. Dr. Pai said that if it were not for the missionaries at Chonju Medical Center, he would be a poor farm boy in Korea.
     For many years Tom Stewart, on behalf of MBF, was instrumental in raising funds for the hospital at Chonju, as well as for missionary salaries. Before passing, Tom Stewart knew he had been a part of that history.

An Interview with Nancy McGaughey,
Mission Co-Worker to Sudan

     When we talked with Nancy McGaughey, she was busy packing for her new three–year posting as a PC(USA) mission co-worker in Southern Sudan. Previously Nancy served in the mountains of Nepal as a health consultant and community health coordinator. Her nursing degree is from Indiana University. She also received a BS in vocational/home economics education and a masters in vocational education from Purdue. MBF has committed to raising support for Nancy McGaughey.

MBF: What will be the focus of your work in Sudan?

Nancy McGaughey: Since this is a new position, I’ll learn a lot more about it as I work into it. Basically, I’ll be helping set up health education programs for ACROSS (a group of Christian relief organizations) and working with the Presbyterian Church of Sudan, a PC(USA) partner.

You’ll be going to an area quite different from Nepal where you were at 10,000 feet. But do you anticipate some of the same health issues as you found in Nepal?

Yes, I expect to find diarrheal diseases of children, malaria, typhoid, hepatitis. As you know, there are many refugees in Sudan, a situation that brings its own set of health issues. As in Nepal, there are few doctors in Sudan, so health education is very important.

From your experience, what are some things a medical mission worker can do to promote health in a developing country?

First, understand local cultures—what they believe and why. And you have to make services available to people. They will not walk miles to services until a health problem becomes an emergency situation and then it’s usually too late.

Your gifts to MBF help support Nancy McGaughey. Your prayers will help her adjust to her new position in Sudan. 

Letters on the New Nursing School in Haiti

To: Mr. George Like, Division Chief ASHA/USAID
From: Dr. Jerry Veldman, MBF

     "How proud ASHA/USAID can be, as you have made possible the only 4-year baccalaureate nursing school in Haiti... I have said often that this is truly a Miracle in Mission. MBF was able to obtain funding from ASHA/USAID to start the school. What followed was the tremendous volunteer efforts on the part of so many here in the USA to get the school organized and funded... Thank you again for this tremendous support. If only the entire world could see how much good the USA is doing to make this a better world through programs such as this."

To: Dr. Jerry Veldman, MBF
From: Mr. George Like, Division Chief ASHA/USAID

     "Thank you for your kind words and photos. I’ve forwarded them to the other members of the ASHA team... Our thanks go to those involved with MBF for the work you do in Haiti and other countries to improve medical care across the world."

Worldwide Community Health in Trouble
But Your Gifts Through MBF Are Making A Difference

     In communities around the world, PC(USA) partners, enabled by your gifts, are turning around the World Health Organization’s (WHO’s) gloomy review. Two years ago, the WHO warned that new medicines and technologies are not solving the health crisis in developing countries. Rather:

• Life expectancies have lowered to half the level of richer countries

• Many countries' health systems are "weak, unresponsive, inequitable - even unsafe"

• Child malnutrition is worse than ever

• The HIV/AIDS pandemic is out of control

• There is a critical shortage of doctors and nurses

     But the poor of the world need more than doctors, says Nils Daulaire, head of the Global Health Council. They need community health that begins with preventive medicine: teaching a community about the importance of clean water, sanitation, nutrition, as well as delivering babies and treating the sick. What are your gifts doing for community health around the world? Here are a few examples:

• In DR Congo, they are helping villagers grow Moringa trees to add to the diet of undernourished children.

• In Malawi, mobile clinics regularly visit villagers who can't travel to hospitals and clinics for treatment. Some bring HIV testing to remote areas.

• In Nepal and India, under the Indigenous Healthcare Worker Education Fund, local people are trained to raise dairy animals to improve nutrition in their communities.

• In South Africa and Ethiopia, health workers are teaching HIV/AIDS prevention and care to communities.

• In Malawi, Dr. Sue Makin, the only gynecologist working outside large cities, is training health workers to test village women for cervical cancer.

• Also in Malawi, where there are 3 doctors for every 150,000 people, Jim McGill coordinates clean water programs for villagers in the Livingstonia Synod, another PC(USA) partner.

• In Haiti, 13 young women and men have graduated from FSIL Nursing School to bring health education and healing to their communities.

Your gifts support critically–needed community health in developing countries. If you are a nurse, doctor, dentist, clinician, etc. consider a short–term assignment where you could help educate village leaders in community health. 

Thank You to Three Generous Churches

     Our thanks to three churches who recently gave special gifts that will impact community health in developing countries.
     Two churches: Union First Presbyterian in Cowansville, PA and First Presbyterian Church in Westfield, NY, gave scholarships for students in the FSIL Nursing School in Haiti.
     First Presbyterian Church of Pompano Beach, FL, raised $50,000 to purchase a mobile clinic vehicle for Embangweni Hospital in Malawi.
     These churches are examples of the many other churches and church groups who also support MBF. We are so thankful for their support as well! MBF is here to provide your church an excellent opportunity for supporting mission. Please contact us for information on what we can do to help your church in such efforts.

Communities outside Embangweni Hospital will be visited by a new mobile clinic vehicle similar to this one because of the generosity of First Presbyterian Church, Pompano Beach, FL

Missionary Sponsorship & Info

Mission Connection is published by the Medical Benevolence Foundation,
a validated support mission of the Presbyterian Church (USA)
3100 S. Gessner, Ste 210, Houston, TX  77063  |  info@MBFoundation.org  |  800-547-7627