TEAM PERU: Week One

Team Peru – the end of week one. Wow, what an amazing campaign. With just over 5-days of clinic (we conducted a couple of impromptu clinics at night) we successfully provided medical, dental and opthmalogical care to just over 1000 patients.

What is particularly satisfying for the campaign this year is the number of Peruvian providers that joined our team and the “bridges” that we built to ensure follow care. This year our “Team Peru” group from North America was joined by 17 Peruvian physicians, dentists, nurses, and translators. It was a fantastic experience to have so many Peruvian participants.

Equally as important to the campaign this year was the “collaboration” that HBI entered into with the Clinical de Ojos Nahui to provide free surgeries to patients identified during the campaign with glaucoma, cataracts or operable ptyrigiums. Clinical Nahui agreed to waive their surgical charges and HBI is helping to provide the money to cover after care and medications.

A very generous donation from the Dunnellon Presbyterian Church in Dunnellon, Florida helped to make this after-care engagement possible. In addition to the surgeries, HBI will also be working to provide an after care “bridge” for children identified in the campaign with medical, dental or social care needs that require follow-up or longitudinal advocacy. HBI staff in Peru will be working with a number of different organizations and clinics to ensure that patients identified in the campaign requiring more advanced care – receive that care.

We arrived in Arequipa late this morning – and the team is really beat. It is amazing how much we have been on the go, go, go for the last week; and everyone is really feeling the strain of too many early mornings and very late nights.

Tonight – everyone will get as much rest as possible. The next week will be a different experience for the team – with a less frenetic pace. This week we will focus on completing a follow-up study on a cohort of pediatric patients identified in the Alto Cayma area as “underserved”, helping to install a water filtration unit in an orphanage, constructing a fence around the volunteer house at the Alto Cayma Mission, and delivering specialty healthcare services in the Alto Cayma Clinic through our volunteer acupuncturist and physical therapist.

We will be posting daily updates on our campaign and including photos of the team and our work. As always, thank you so much for your on-going support of HBI.