16 Year Anniversary

April is our anniversary month; the clinic began in 2004 or 16 years ago. Over the years, we have provided healthcare for thousands of people who place their trust in us for their simple healthcare needs. We have updated our tables, to show the activity that is generated; through our medical and dental care plus our outreach of milk distribution to babies/toddlers. Thank God, that we are able to provide this outreach to the people surrounding Jocotan/Camotan.

Servant Ministries Clinics Program

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 1 hour 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. The larger facility allows us to use the reception area to function as a store as well. We sell hygiene products, clothes, toys, school supplies and more. The clinic does not generate enough funding to keeping it running or pay its staff. This store provides the necessary funding to keep our doors open.

In 2010 we became an outreach to babies and toddlers; providing milk to those who are malnourished. Baby formula is like powdered gold and literally keeps these babies alive. Even the local health department sends babies to us that are in need of receiving baby formula, as they do not have the ability to provide it. Toddlers receive full cream powdered milk. We are always in need of donations of both of these types of milk.

In 2012 we added optical care to our clinic’s offered services. We are able to give full eye exams and have thousands of refurbished glasses, provided by a Lion’s Club, to hand out at no cost to the people.

In 2013 we built two storerooms that house our supply of medicine and the inventory for the store. We reach out and help thousands of people each year through the clinic’s many services. 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.

Clinics Video

Medical Service Update

Servant Ministries’ medical clinic began 16 years ago; in 2004. We treat the chronic on-going issues that seem to plaque the people and most simple ailments. Ana Orellana is the nurse and administrator over the clinic and has been with us since the clinic’s start up. The clinic is open 3 mornings a week and the charge to be seen is approximately $1.30 and medicine is given out without any charge. Our Embrace children (Servant Ministries’ child sponsorship program) receive any of the clinic’s services without charge. The clinic also serves the general public and many take advantage of that.

Since the clinic was launched in 2004, we have added dental service, optical eye examinations and giving of glasses, and a milk program to babies and toddlers. The clinic has a store that sells clothes, hygiene products, toys and other miscellaneous things as a way to generate the funding that it needed to pay the clinic staff. The tables for each outreach have been updated as well as many of the photos.

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PATIENT TALLY FROM APRIL 2019-MARCH 2020
GENERAL PUBLIC	NUMBER OF PATIENTS	TOTAL VISITS
One time visit	276	276
Repeated second visit	18	36
Repeated third visit	7	21
Repeated fourth visit	1	4
Repeated sixth visit	1	6
Repeated seventh visit	1	7
Repeated eighth visit	1	8
Repeated ninth visit	1	9
Repeated Eighteenth visit	1	18
EMBRACE VISITS
One time visit	74	74
Repeated second visit	23	46
Repeated third visit	6	36
Repeated fourth visit	4	16
Repeated fifth visit	2	10
TOTALS	679	833
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
Visits from April 2009-April 2010	804	1,217
Visits from April 2010-April 2011	1,262	1,555
Visits from April 2011-March 2012	887	1,235
Visits from April 2012-March 2013	1,223	3,107
Visits from April 2013-March 2014	831	1,264
Visits from April 2014-March 2015	1,037	1,492
Visits from April 2015-March 2016	792	1,180
Visits from April 2016-March 2017	702	1,099
Visits from April 2017-March 2018	524	775
Visits From April 2018-March 2019	416	567
To Date:	14,310	21,544

Dental Service

Update on Dental Outreach

Our dental outreach continues to reach out to many people; providing the basic services to do cleanings, fillings, fluoride treatments and extractions. Our Embrace children are the ones who mostly fill up our schedule as we only have a dentist that can work on Saturdays. We require the Embrace children to have an annual cleaning, trying to educate the parents of the need to get into preventative oral health care and not wait until extractions are needed. We sometimes take parents of our Embrace children when they have need of a dental appointment, or others from town, as we have the appointment times available to do so. Our fees are about half of what you would pay at other clinics; we are just trying to cover our expenses. We are posting an updated annual chart to show you the dental activity that has happened.

The following table shows the activity of our “Dental Services” that were provided in 2009. Remember that the dentist is only working on Saturdays, so we believe that we have been able to reach a lot of people through this outreach at the ministry’s clinic.

 

DENTAL SERVICE RENDERED 2011-2019
NAME	Year 2011	Year 2012	Year 2013	Year 2014	Year 2015	Year 2016	Year 2017	Year 2018	Year 2019
Embrace	TOTALS	TOTALS
# Of Patients	215	308	406	268	242	267	238	247	220
Extractions	66	129	125	107	70	102	54	47	50
Cleanings	165	193	236	144	178	198	192	192	194
Fillings	165	68	73	100	30	17	192	35	40
Flouride Treatments	38	193	236	142	177	198	7	192	194
General Public
# Of Patients		26	30	38	63	55	27	41	30
Extractions		26	26	57	72	70	23	45	40
Cleanings		3	2	1	3	4	6	3	10
Fillings		2	6	1	1	0	0	2	4
Flouride Treatments		0	2	0	0	0	0	1	4

 

Optical Service

We have equipment to do eye examinations; both in the physical clinic as well as portable equipment to take out to mountain villages. Funds were raised in Graham, TX (through a Presbyterian church and local Lion's Club) to purchase this equipment; as well as supply us with 1000s of pairs of glasses that can be utilized. A nominal fee is charged for the examination and glasses are given out at no charge.

Milk Outreach to Babies/Toddlers

In 2010 we started an outreach to babies and toddlers in need. Our Embrace (Child Sponsorship Program) starts with children of 4 years of age and older. Sometimes we find younger children that have great need, and we wanted to develop an outreach to help them. We give baby formula to babies who are malnourished. Sometimes a mother dies in child birth and family members are left to care for the newborn. Buying formula is not an option as the people do not have the resources to make that kind of a purchase.

Sometimes a mother just doesn't have an adequate milk supply; usually in part to her own poor health. We encourage her to nurse but we supplement her milk supply. The babies are brought to the ministry clinic once a month, to be monitored and weighed so that we are assured that the baby is improving in their health.

Full cream powdered milk is provided for toddlers who are malnourished and monitored in the same way, on a monthly basis.

We have a new outreach that we are wanting to take on; that is an outreach to babies born with cleft lips. We have recently received interest from a surgeon that would like to come do surgical procedures on babies with cleft pallets and lips. It made me think about the fact that you do not see small children with this problems and it got me thinking. Unless we can help these babies when they are tiny......they will die! They cannot nurse and latch unto their mother's breast, even if she does have a milk supply. Baby formula and special bottles are needed to allow these babies to be nourished and maintained; until surgery can be done. This outreach will literally save these babies lives! We will keep you posted on this site on cases that we are doing.

We are always in need of donations of baby formula or donations that allow us to do the purchase of formula in Guatemala; which is even a better option! Donations can be made to "Servant Ministries" and sent to PO Box 596073 Fort Gratiot, MI 48059 and designated for "baby formula". Hep us reach out to these precious little ones to "give them life"!