Clinic Update
We are finding a lot of malnourished babies that need to be put on formula. Either the mother has lost her milk altogether or as in most cases she just doesn’t have enough to cause her baby to flourish. Our area is in drought and famine. This affects the health of everyone but most easily affect these little ones. We are currently helping 14 different babies and committing to giving them what they need each month to help them to recuperate to a healthy level. Some of our teams bring down powdered formula and we have some donations that come in sporadically. It is like “powdered gold” to us and we have seen the difference that it makes to cause these babies to thrive. If you can help us with the donation of any baby powdered milk formula, please communicate with our US office by calling (810)385-4338 or write by email to nancy@servantministries.net.
Below is our new table that reflects the number of patients that we have served over the last year and to date over our 5 years of operation.
| PATIENT TALLY FROM MAY 2009 - APRIL 2010 |
| VISITS |
NUMBER OF PATIENTS |
TOTAL VISITS |
| One time visit |
589 |
589 |
| Repeated second visit |
121 |
242 |
| Repeated third visit |
57 |
171 |
| Repeated fourth visit |
14 |
56 |
| Repeated fifth visit |
9 |
45 |
| Repeated sixth visit |
6 |
36 |
| Repeated seventh visit |
3 |
21 |
| Repeated eighth visit |
1 |
8 |
| Repeated tenth visit |
2 |
20 |
| Repeated thirteenth visit |
1 |
13 |
| Repeated sixteenth visit |
1 |
16 |
| TOTALS |
804 |
1217 |
| Visits from April 2004-April 2005 |
1,603 |
2,224 |
| Visits from April 2005-April 2006 |
1,147 |
1,564 |
| Visits from April 2006-April 2007 |
1,436 |
1,875 |
| Visits from April 2007-April 2008 |
976 |
1,366 |
| Visits from April 2008-April 2009 |
670 |
1,024 |
| To Date: |
6636 |
9270 |
Medical Clinic
Servant Ministries began a medical clinic in April of 2004. We saw the need to provide medical care at affordable prices to the people from the mountain villages. There are local health departments that provide free medical attention, but for the most part they don’t have the medicine that is needed to treat the people. Putting a name on their condition without providing the means to alleviate it is of little use. People from the mountain villages are also apprehensive about going to the local health departments. Situations have improved in recent years, but in the past there were real “caste issues” between seeing a patient from the town and seeing one from the mountain village, who are from more pure Mayan descent. We try to treat each patient that comes to our clinic with the respect and love of God that they deserve!
Servant Ministries hosts short term medical teams that come and do outreaches in the remote mountain villages, taking the clinics to the people for one day outreaches. They leave behind their left over meds and this is what allows us to operate the on-going medical clinic for the ministry. Our current schedule is to be open 3 days a week. We have a nurse who operates the clinic and she deals with all of the chronic on-going health issues and we stock the necessary meds to help the people. We are able to offer testing for glucose, breathing treatments and coordinate with a lab when lab tests are necessary.
Also, Ana, our nurse, is a Christian and can many times offer encouragement, counsel and prayer to our patients and they leave having been treated for the “whole person”.
The people pay a minimal fee (equivalent to 2 hours of work at minimum wage) for their consultation with the nurse. This helps to pay for the nurse and receptionist’s wages. Then the meds are given without cost. We run a small store at the clinic as well, to help offset the costs of the clinic and to keep fees charged to a minimum.
As of October of 2007, we began to offer dental service at the clinic as well. We have a local dentist come every Saturday who does extractions, cleanings and fillings at cost. We have seen a tremendous response to this outreach and have appointments made usually for up to 2 months in advance. People have had chronic teeth problems, many times for years, and it is a real blessing to be able to give them a pain free mouth and to help teach them oral hygiene.
In December of 2009 we dedicated a new clinic building to house our medical/dental clinic. It has much larger exam rooms for both medical and dental consultations plus 2 bathrooms, a very large reception/store area and nicer ambiance. The surrounding security wall was brought up to full height. Our next construction for the clinic will be to build a duo storage rooms to house our meds and store inventory plus an area to start our own lab. If you are interested in helping, please communicate with our US office by calling (810)385-4338 or writing an email to nancy@servantministries.net.