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Mission Doctors Association On-Line Spring 2005 Newsletter
Auxiliary Benefit – April 16, 2005, To Honor Msgr. Lawrence O’Leary.
For more than 40 years, a group of dedicated women in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles has made it possible for Catholic doctors and their families to serve the poor at mission hospitals and clinics around the world.
The Mission Doctors Auxiliary will hold its annual benefit on April 16 at the Jonathan Club in downtown Los Angeles. Msgr. Lawrence O’Leary, former local director of the Mission Office and current pastor emeritus of St. Martin of Tours Church, will be honored. During his years as both associate director and director, Msgr. O’Leary was not only instrumental in the formation of physicians, but also visited many of them in the missions.
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Msgr. O’Leary
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Mission Doctors recently expanded its medical outreach to Uganda with the arrival in January of Bill and Kate Walsh. Margaret Liautaud and Mary Lou Malphus, co-chairwomen of the benefit, are hopeful it will be the most successful event in the organization’s history to help provide for this growth.
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Msgr. O’Leary with early class of lay missionaries in formation
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“The expansion of the program to Uganda this year, and the need for ongoing support for our other doctors and their families, compels us to do the best we can,” said Mrs. Liautaud. “It is a unique partnership we have. We work to raise the funds here in Southern California to make it possible for the doctors and their families to serve people in Third World countries around the world. Together we know we can — we know we are — making a real difference.”
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For more information and an invitation to the benefit, contact Elise Frederick, executive director of the Mission Doctors Association, at (213) 368-1875 or by e-mail: missiondrs@earthlink.net . Please provide your complete mailing address. (Photos available upon request).
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March Annual Retreat/Seminar
Veteran Mission Doctors, Kate Bolton, John Ruley, Brent Burket, Pat & Nora Ryan and Peter Meade came together in March to once again offer information to doctors considering short-term mission work.
During this past year the following doctors have served short-term in Cameroon, Guatemala, Ecuador, Ghana and Zimbabwe: Dr. Kate Bolton and husband Mr. John Ruley, Dr. George and Mrs. Carolyn Brannen, Dr. Louis and Mrs. Marty Coda & family, Dr. Pete and Mrs. Betty Frelinger, Dr. Danilo Galura, Dr. James Guzek, Dr. Jim and Mrs. Terry Hake, Dr. Regina Hur, Dr. Michael and Mrs. Dianne Lynch, Dr. Linda Novak, Dr. Sara and Mr. Jeff Petruska.
Dr. Jim Hake wrote of their experience:
“What an amazing experience it was to leave the comforts of home and settle into the daily routines of a third world country a few days later. Terry spent her days assisting at the orphanage and working at Project Hope, a local HIV/AIDS awareness program. The scope of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Africa takes on a new dimension when you work with the people who are the victims. There were multiple new cases of HIV daily and its effects are obviously devastating with over one half of the adults in the hospital HIV positive.
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My days were spent attending hospitalized patients and staffing the outpatient clinic. Malaria, Tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS, Hepatitis, Gastroenteritis and Dehydration were the most frequent problems dealt with. The 150 bed, St. Martin De Porres Hospital is currently staffed by three Cameroonian doctors who do an amazing job. The Tertiary Sisters of St. Frances, led by Sister Xaveria provide the leadership to a very dedicated staff. Limited diagnostics (x-ray and lab) and medications provided daily challenges.
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The people of Njinikom and St. Anthony's Parish warmly welcomed us. We witnessed a strong presence of the Catholic faith in the community and hospital. The happiness of the people was impressive despite a lack of material wealth. Our lives have been enriched by the experience and we plan to return to Njinikom in the future and continue our association with MDA. Thank you for all your support."
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Bill and Kate Walsh are Commissioned and Arrive in Uganda
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On December 19, Bill and Kate Walsh were commissioned as the newest members of Mission Doctors Association and after visiting with family in Chicago for a few weeks, arrived in Uganda on January 21st. After a brief stay in the capitol they traveled to the Diocese of Kabale and Karol Lwanga Catholic Hospital where they will serve for the next three years.
Bill is a graduate of Loyola University, who completed his surgical residency in Missouri and was in private practice in Oregon, Michigan and for the last 19 years, Illinois. Kate is a graduate of St. Francis Hospital School of Nursing in Illinois. The couple had applied to Mission Doctors Association during Bill’s residency in 1975, but chose to wait until their seven children were grown and on their own.
Bill and Kate are already at work sharing their professional skills every day. Kate wrote shortly after they arrived, “They are having a malaria |
outbreak at this time (at the hospital) …it is so overcrowded, two patients to a bed in pediatrics. “ Kate added, “It is really a very big adjustment.”
We are confident that they will make this adjustment and will also make a very big difference in the lives of many people in the next three years.
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Coda Family Complete Time in Cameroon
Lou and Marty Coda served in Papua New Guinea for three years in the 1990s. They have just completed a six-month assignment in Cameroon and Lou reflected on the experience in their final days there. His words are both revealing and inspirational as he shares both his frustrations and his faith:
On arriving in Cameroon, I was re-awakened to life in a third-world country, after our time in PNG ten years ago. Life here is raw, there is very little "covering" or "cushioning" for the pain and suffering |
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which is everyday life. Each day, as I walk past the wards, I see patients and I wonder if they will live another day. I see their families' fears, and I am anxious and burdened that they reach out to me in hope that I can help them, when so often there is little to do but be with them in their suffering.
Certainly there are many if not most of the patients who are able to walk out of the hospital cured of their malaria, typhoid, TB, pneumonias, and other assorted illnesses. However, it is the HIV infant who weighs half of his expected weight at a year's age and his mother's tears after hearing the child's diagnosis that is hard to get over. Or watching a father who faithfully stays at his teenage son's bedside seeing him covered with sweat
from fever, moaning in pain from an illness that fills his bone marrow and is slowly dissolving his bones. Somehow knowing that the sickness is most likely a non-treatable lymphoma rather than the hoped-for TB for which he is being treated, that brings pain to any father who is willing to share in these two's lot.
But why subject myself to such an ugly part of life? Where is the pursuit of happiness in all of this? Why trust that below this boiling cauldron is a purify fire? Because the only choice is to lay "asleep", anesthetized and slowly withering or to wake up and embrace a life that will not let me stay the same. I have heard the words a thousand times but not understood them that it is by dying that we are born to eternal life. Stop thinking of where I want my life to go, what I want to be, but rather that it is enough to try and listen to the soft whispers of God calling us to trust and follow Him.
Now looking back on five months, where have I been led? I think of a young mother with her unnamed premature infant. The child was brought to the hospital from an outlying health center because of persistent vomiting. He was almost half his birth weight of 1800 grams, too weak to cry, his small wrinkled face adding an aged look to a life that had barely begun. The nursing staff seemed reluctant to do much to help this infant, perhaps because they thought the situation was hopeless or perhaps because they did not think the mother had the resources to pay for the required care. Since I was asked to try and help, I began by convincing the staff that the infant needed intravenous fluid if we wanted to try to keep him alive. What was initially thought to be a form of colitis was, after a week of trying to get barium contrast x-rays done, found to be a congenital cyst obstructing the end of the small bowel. Then another week followed trying to arrange for the surgeon and anesthesia staff to repair the problem and trying to come up with enough money for the surgery. Eventually with the help of a kind and generous Italian medical student and some of my friends back in the states we came up with the 80,000 cfas needed to proceed with the surgery. A week passed before the child had its first bowel movement then four hours later, worn out, he died. I called the mother in to hold her child, she knew he was dying, she only said thank you.
With an overwhelming sense of failure I left the nursery. One of the nurses who I had thought I had been upsetting by doing so much for the baby said as I was leaving "we could have written a story about this baby if he had lived." I left wondering if I was so disappointed because the baby died or was it because I was not the one who saved him. That afternoon I went for a long walk in a heavy rain. It wasn't until a few weeks later that I saw the baby's mother again lying in bed being treated for typhoid. She only smiled at me and said thank you. I saw her again three weeks later, working in one of the sisters' gardens as a way of helping to pay back some of the hospital bill. Before she left for her home she came to our house with one of the kind sisters to formally greet and thank me for the help I had provided. She said little, spoke with a softness filled with gratitude and love telling me that she was "like daughter" to me and could only offer her thanks. I knew it was not I but the love of God that I had allowed to work through me that she had sensed so keenly. The last I saw of this woman was a few mornings later as I was walking to the hospital talking with someone. Off to the side I saw her looking at me as I walked. A minute later I turned to her and still her eyes followed me with that look of gratitude and love, no further words were spoken between us and I shall not forget what she had given to me.
My time in Cameroon has brought slow but deep changes within me, changes that are only possible in a world where life cannot afford diversions and the hand of God works in everyday life.
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Ground Breaking in Zimbabwe:
Dr. Richard Stoughton: FRIDAY, 14 JANUARY:
What a great day! We had our “ground-breaking” ceremony for the addition to the Nurses Training School, and it was really very, very good. The day was perfect, and now there is thunder and lightning and so hopefully we get some really good rain.We desperately need the rain. (We did have about 3 inches of rain over four days. |
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Dr. Xaba
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| This is SO necessary for the peasant farmers in this area, as good rainfall is the difference between having enough food or having starvation). We had invited the “Permanent Secretary for Health” Dr. Xaba for the ceremony, and she came, along with several others from her office plus the Provincial Medical Director and Dr. Tsododo, the District Medical Officer, plus several from Mvuma. Srs. Ferrera, Patricia, and Rosemary came from Harare. Chief Hama was here, plus members from the police and from the local Council. It was a very nice event, and I had a great time to talk with Dr. Xaba during lunch and then also took her on a tour of the hospital. The Ministry of Health has become extremely supportive of ALL of our projects here, and it really looks like 2005 is going to be a good year. We have received $80 million Zim ($15,000 US – that is a LOT for us) for “make-up” for our recurrent |
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expenses of last year; also $180 million Zim ($30,000 US) for the Nursing School supplies for 2004, and a promise of about $450 million Zim ($75,000 US) for 2005. Our recurrent expenditure amount for this year is also up dramatically. The total amount for 2004 was $90 million, and this year it is going to be $550 million ($96,500 US). It sounds quite amazing that I am talking about less than US $100,000 being a “great amount” for us to |
run a 188 bed hospital plus a busy out-patient department, plus all of the out reach that we do! This is the amount that we have to buy ALL non-medical and non-surgical supplies (all food, laundry supplies, cleaning supplies, linens, vehicle expenses and diesel, etc., etc. for an entire year).
They also have told us we are one of the “priority” hospitals to be getting anti-retroviral drugs during 2005. It is hard for me to put onto paper the good feeling that I have about all of this. As I said, I think that 2005 is going to be a very good year for us. Now if we could just find a third doctor to be here on either an intermittent basis or even on a permanent basis, then I would feel like the work-load would not be so severe, and we could really get going with the ARV program. Elise at Mission Doctors has told me that there are six doctors signed up for the March retreat for “short-term” doctors”. Maybe some of them will come for three months like the Lynch’s have done. We really have to get going with a third doctor’s house.
In early January we made an eight-day retreat at a Benedictine Monastery. It was really a great time for us; good to be “totally away” and to have time to really reflect and meditate and pray. Both of us came away with some really good New Year’s resolutions, which we really can keep and will be good for us both spiritually and physically. I think that many of our prayers have already been answered.
So much good news, and so many things for us to be thankful about. Praise the Lord!
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Update from the Cavanaghs
Greetings to all of the Mission Doctors Association Family!
We were blessed this last week by the arrival of Dr. and Mrs. Lynch who are here on a short-term mission from Mission Doctors Association. I went about orienting Mike to the work here but quickly found that all I really needed to do was show him where the exam room and patients were. His expertise in Internal Medicine has been a great asset to us already. Likewise, Diane has "hit the ground running" and is already caring for the infant of a woman who is admitted to the hospital and is too ill to care for her child. It will be a great three months with them both here!
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We continue to have a small number of patients on "Anti-Retroviral" HIV medications, a number which is slowly growing. It has been painful to watch the different medical course of the patients who are able to receive the anti-retroviral medications and those who are not able to afford the U.S. $32 or so that the medications cost each month. It is part of Sheila's and my daily prayers that these medications will soon become available to all the people in this region who need them. There are occasional moments of joy in caring for the children with HIV, though. One girl of about 8 or 9 has been in the hospital for most of the last threemonths with HIV and Tuberculosis, her weight down to 24 pounds and at the point of death on several occasions. For some reason, I will never know why, she gradually began to improve to the point where she was able to go home. Her mother brought her in to see us and show us her school report card this last week! She had gained 12 pounds, and looked bright, happy, and just generally wonderful. Needless to say, we all hugged her and kept congratulating her on all of the A's and B's on her report card.
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Sheila continues in her work at the Mission grade school teaching art to the young children and her work at the hospital helping to care for infants whose mothers are not able to continue to takecare of them. She has also been able to console herself in the loss of her beloved pottery workshop in the U.S. by....well by doing pottery. She now fires her pieces with ox dung (it is really hard to get good ox dung in the U.S.) and glazes them with hot corn meal.
God repeatedly reminds us here that we also care for many healthy people - it is sometimes easy to forget this. I was walking down the hall of the hospital recently when I looked out the hall window toward the "staying house" where |
pregnant woman can stay for the last month or so of their pregnancy. I saw about 10 or 15 very pregnant women racing each other up the hill to the hospital for prenatal clinic. They were all due within the next few weeks, were barefoot, and were running up a hill just for the joy of it. It wasn't just the sight of all of these young, healthy, pregnant women running, but it was how very fast they were all able to run! A wonderful sight.
Sheila and I keep you all in our prayers each day and ask that you would all do the same for us. Thanks to all who continue in their support of Mission Doctors Association. Your support is vital to this work. There is a high school nestled in the rolling hills we travel through on the way to one of our outlying clinics. Painted in red on each of the stone pillars marking the entrance to the school are the words, "Deeds, not words." I think of those of you who support this work each time we pass those stone pillars.
God Bless,
Tim Cavanagh
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Sheila Cavanagh reflects on one year in Zimbabwe
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Editor’s note: I asked Sheila to reflect on their first year in Zimbabwe – as the spouse in Zimbabwe she doesn’t have an official ‘job’ because work permits are only given to the doctors, however Sheila continues to find ways to be of service to the children at the hospital and school as a volunteer.
You had asked us to write and reflect on the first year here. I won't say it has been easy, it is probably the hardest thing we have ever done. Sometimes we get so homesick for the girls that it hurts. The one thing that has kept us here is really feeling that God is calling us to do this. If we did not feel this completely we would not be here right now.
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There have been so many positive things that we really feel God's presence in everything we do. One thing is our prayer life together. We are able to go to Mass everyday together, that had always been something we could only do together when Tim was on vacation. We also do the liturgy of the hours together. We hope to keep doing this after we get home, too, and not let it die out.
The people we have met have been outstanding. They are so strong; even though some do not have enough to eat, they have a strong faith and love for God. With so many people infected with HIV/AIDS they still give praise. What a lesson for me to see.
The community we have with the Stoughton's and the Sisters has been a gift too. Loretta and Dick have been most helpful in helping us get settled. They have been a great support and we have had the blessings of sharing many meals together. One of the SJI sisters, Sister John, has really been a gift to me. Whenever I get "down", she comes for a visit. She always makes me laugh when she talks about eating mice and what is going on at the school with the girls.
When I say that God has been taking care of us; one time we were walking and were just saying that it would be so nice to be able to talk to someone in English. Then a guy came to his gate and invited us in to his yard. It turned out that he lives in Saudi Arabia. It was most interesting. Also just when we really are feeling homesick we will get a call from the girls. It is very hard for them to get a connection to the country. Sometimes they try for many days to get through, but the e-mail has been pretty reliable.
The time I had with the infant whose mother died at birth was very special, I will always cherish it. Again I know that God's hand was in that. Since then there have been little things that have come up that I have been able to help with. One thing is the art class for Sister Pauline. The children have been so great; the lack of supplies has made it a challenge but they love anything you do. I take a lot of pictures; everyone loves it when you take their pictures and the camera we have shows the picture. It is amazing that whenever you start everyone comes to get in. The teens love to "strike a pose".
Living in the rural area has been different. We do not have a landline phone so we never hear the phone ring. When the cell phone rings we wonder what that noise is at first then we get so excited. There are no planes that fly overhead except for once in a while, the military will fly over. Going to town (Masvingo) has been a challenge too. The prices are going up everyday and there is a real shortage of petrol so that makes it hard to get around. One of the things I have really enjoyed also is walking to the township, it is fun to see the kids say "good morning" and then we hear them laughing as they pass because they got to use their English.
Whenever I go out with Sister Cecilia to do something with the orphans it saddens me so much to think that we have so much and they have nothing but their spirit is inspiring to me. That is what I will remember always. Am I looking forward to another two years? No, not really. It is still painful to be away from the girls. But God is so good to us, how can we refuse Him when we really feel that this is what God wants us to do. Will we do it again? Yes, we are talking about it now.
Lets see how the last two years go; there is always a lot to look forward to.
God bless,
Sheila
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Book on the Life of Founder Now Available
Mission Doctors are there today; will you help them be there tomorrow?
• Today women came to St. Theresa’s Catholic Hospital in Zimbabwe and found Mission Doctors ready to see their sick children.
• Today a man admitted to Karoli Luwanga Catholic Hospital in Uganda had a successful surgery, performed by a Mission Doctor.
• Today a Cameroonian doctor learned a new technique from a Mission Doctor at Shisong Hospital in Cameroon.
• Today US Medical School students had an opportunity to see first hand the needs of Christ’s poor in Guatemala, and were mentored by a Mission Doctor.
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But the needs won’t end today.
Tomorrow there will be more sick children, more people in need of surgery, and other doctors and medical students who can benefit from the guidance of a qualified mentor.
Mission Doctors Association, now in our 46th year providing - not only excellent medical care, but compassionate care as well, - needs your help to be there tomorrow.
A gift of $10.00 a month, or more, helps us support the work of Catholic Mission Doctors who freely give their time in response to the Christ’s call to ‘heal the sick’.
Your monthly donation can be arrange by credit card or Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT) – which would automatically be debited from your checking account monthly.
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This special level of support and commitment will help Mission Doctors be there tomorrow – and they will be there because you have made it possible.
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Financial contributions to Mission Doctors Association are tax-deductible.
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It may also be possible to double your gifts if your company offers Matching Gifts
Click Here ( online directory of matching gift companies ) to find out if your company will match your contribution. If you have questions about your company's matching gift program, please contact your personnel office.
Some people look at the number of people suffering in the world and say “What can be done?” By becoming a monthly donor to Mission Doctors Association you demonstrate that you know there is always something that can be done today, and tomorrow.
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Thank you for your commitment to the health of our brothers and sisters around the world!
ONLINE NEWS ARCHIVES
Spring 2004 Newsletter
Spring 2003 Newsletter
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