Tuesday September 10

We had another productive day, even if it wasn't filled with exciting cases. Diego and I started with a 4 year old who had the biggest inguinal hernia I have ever seen in someone that age! It was indeed an African hernia, filling his scrotum so that it extended halfway down to his knee ! We also explored the other side, and fixed his large umbilical hernia. While we were doing that, John and Jonathan removed a large lipoma from the shoulder of a relative of Barbu. Then we had two more inguinal hernias in adults; the man that Diego and I repaired is an Assistant Minister in one of the government departments who had his hernia repaired originally in a clinic about 10 years ago, but it recurred. With some difficulty we were able to identify some decent tissue to use in the repair. At home most everyone would use mesh for such repairs, but I remain nervous about implanting mesh under aseptic, but not necessarily sterile, conditions. Finally John and Jonathan drained a subphrenic abscess.
      After lunch, I met Robert Dulo from the New Sight Eye Clinic to give him an item from Karen King. Robert is an ophthalmic nurse who went to The Gambia ( I think) to learn how to do cataract surgery. His dream was to come back to Liberia and set up a clinic; he met Karen when she was in Africa, and she decided to help make it happen. Karen is an elementary school teacher in Newtown, CT whom I met through Adamah Sirleaf, and who has now become a good friend. To raise money for the clinic, I think Karen spoke to every Rotary Club in CT, and lots of other groups as well, and managed to raise the money Robert needed for his clinic. It is been in operation for about 2 years, and he is already looking to move to larger premises to accommodate all of his patients. It's really a fascinating story of dreams, kindness, motivation, and vision in every sense of the word. We will try to have dinner later this week before we leave.
      We then went to the Conference Room in the Administration Building to empty our duffels, and to look through all of the supplies which I had sent via cargo container through Mr. Garbla. We have about 9000 pair of gloves as well as sterile disposable gowns and drapes, and many other supplies donated by my friends at Waterbury Hospital and its suppliers. Once again my special thanks to Donna, Mary, and Tanya for their kindness and diligence in finding supplies to donate to JFK. In this vein, I should also note that the charitable organization Americares now has a program to provide medical supplies to mission trios such as ours, and we were able to obtain a number of useful items which we have used on is trip.