200 to benefit from Medical Mission Foundation

Sep 29, 2015

By 8am Monday morning, more than 300 patients from Lira, Kitgum, South Sudan and majority from Gulu, were already gathered to undergo examination and check-up to access treatment at a medical camp at Lacor hospital

By Owiny Jolly Tobbia

By 8am Monday morning, more than 300 patients from Lira, Kitgum, South Sudan and majority from Gulu, were already gathered to undergo examination and check-up to access treatment at a medical camp at Lacor hospital.


More than 200 patients are expected to be operated upon by a team of medical experts under Medical Missions Foundation.

The team comprising doctors, nurses, audiologists, medical students and other health professionals from the University of Kansas Medical Center and the University of Kansas Hospital, arrived in Gulu on Sunday and are set to perform surgeries and treat different ailments, according to the team's spokesperson, Abigail Hayo, who is also a member on the board of trustees of the foundation.

Kansas University Hospital surgeons performing a neck operation at Lacor hospital in Gulu during the medical camp on Monday.

Hayo said this will be their sixth year to operate a medical camp in Gulu and look to work on acid victims, cleft palates, goiter, neck and head complications, hernia, keloids, hydrocele and other simple surgeries.

"We have a great group of anesthetists, nurses, physicians and ancillary people and we shall all work together in both the two hospitals and the two health centers in Aswa County." Hayo said.

"The people are unbelievably friendly and grateful for us being here," she said.

"They would have to be at the hospital at 6am even if their surgery was in the afternoon, and no one ever complained, not even the little kids."

The annual medical camp has given a lot of boost to Lacor hospital, according to a recent statement by Dr. Martin Ogwang, head of surgeons at Lacor hospital.

One of the doctors from Kansas Hospital gives a toy to Douglas Ocaka at Lacor Hospital surgery ward. Douglas is a candidate for Hernia operation on Tuesday.

"We have six theatres but we had to close others after some of the equipment got worn out coupled with financial constraints," Ogwang said.

"It is very touching to see the difference it makes in so many lives," Constantine Ojok, a 47-year-old man from Amuru whose face and arms were burnt during an LRA attack in 2002 said, as he lay on his recovery bed after a corrective surgery. His smiles and gratitude looked to be infectious from his face.     

"It was too hard for me considering the stigma and financial worries it caused me. I am very positive for this and genuinely appreciate God for whatever He has done for me."

Ojok is among the 217 patients so far registered to benefit from the exercise that ends on Friday, a figure smaller compared to last year's 235.

Medical Missions Foundation was formed in 1996 to provide critical care for the world's disadvantaged and forgotten and has long patterned with Kansas University Medical Center and University of Kansas Hospital.

Currently they operate in Guatemala, Philippines, Mali and Uganda.

 

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