2020

2020 has been a year of disappointment and adjustment.

With trips to Kenya and Ethiopia cancelled due to COVID and travel shutdowns and restrictions for much of the year. With faith and persistence we were finally able to travel to Cameroon this November/December. We had our first visa applications refused so we sent them again. The airlines changed our flights 4 times making connections and layovers impossible. But in the end with Gods help we were able to pull it all together.

It’s been a couple year since we’ve been able to visit Cameroon because of the conflict going on in the area that we work. Visitors have been scarce so they were delighted and encouraged that we were able to come. Because it was too dangerous to visit Banso Hospital farther north, we limited our trip to Mbingo Hospital.

We were able to do a lot of teaching with the Internal Medicine residents, PAACS surgical residents, OR staff and ECHO technicians.

Ethiopia Team

I would like to introduce you our Ethiopia Rheumatic Heart Disease screening team..

This hard working team has screened well over 4000 school aged children for RHD.

They are making a difference in the lives of many.

Update on Patience/Joy

You may remember Patience, the young lady from Cameroon who came to Kenya so that we could fix her valve with the balloon procedure. Her family was so overjoyed with the successful result of the procedure that they had a big ceremony to change her name to JOY. She has since married and she and her husband are expecting their first child. It brings us so much JOY to see how well she’s doing.