ABOUT US

A WORK IN PROGRESS by Dr. Novotny
Members of the Columbus Medical Mission Team, Sue Tillinghast, LPN and I first explored medical mission work in 1999 when we traveled to Ecuador with Dr. Robert Smith, an Oral Surgeon from Norfolk, Nebraska and his crew who had been doing mission work there for several years.  The trip was great, but the timing didn't work so well because we had kids still in school and obligations that made trips like this difficult to pursue.

Dr. N and Sue T.  in OR, Ecuador 1999

Ecuador Team 1999

Nine years later, in 2008 my daughter, Giana and I joined a Methodist team that had an established mission in Jamaica.  It involved a well run mission with many dedicated volunteers, but there was only clinical work to be done and surgical work in the hospital was not being done.

Clinic in Jamaica 2008

Jamaica team 2008

My husband John and I, then traveled to Nicaragua in the spring of 2009 as chaperones for a college age group from Federated Church.  This trip included our daughters, Ashley and Giana along with Ashley's husband, Rick. We stayed at Villa Esperanza in Managua, a rescue mission run by Forward Edge International, (FEI) for girls who had been living in the dump, La Chureka.

Villa Esperanza Team 2009

La Chureka 2009 Roofing

It was an eye-opening experience to work putting roofs (tar paper) on shacks in the dump, scooping drainage ditches in an orphanage and doing maintenance at the Managua Public Children's Hospital among other things.  While washing windows in the Managua hospital it was painfully obvious that to travel that distance and put in this much time and money, my efforts would be better spent doing medicine instead of maintenance.  I asked the American missionaries at Villa Esperanza what medical missions they were aware of.  They directed us to a mission in Puerto Cabezas, Nicaragua.  This is a city on the Atlantic coast that serves the Native American Miskito tribe.

In February 2010 we formed the 'Columbus Medical Mission Team' and traveled with FEI to Puerto Cabezas.  We stayed at the Verbo Church compound and worked in the local hospital alongside some dedicated missionaries from California. We traveled there again in 2011 and some of our team, by then, had connected with the California team and so have continued to go to PC.

Original Nicaragua Medical Team 2010

Waiting room in PC 2010

Nicaragua Team 2011

Clefts done in PC 2011

I decided I wanted to get more training and experience in cleft lip and palate so began attending courses at the American Academy of Otolaryngology Head and Neck Surgery meetings where I was introduced to many other medical missionaries.  Dr. Lisa Buckmiller was influential in giving me additional training and then invited me to go with her mission to Guatemala in the fall of 2011.  This was strictly a cleft lip and palate trip.  John and I gained valuable experience on that trip, not only because of the clefts, but also in terms of organizing the group, and we again met many more missionaries whose stories are fascinating to hear.

Guatemalan Cleft child

Guarded by the Guatemalan Army 2011

While future trips to Guatemala remain on the table, we had long thought of traveling to Africa and met a surgeon with a mission in DR Congo.

Although the trip to DR Congo didn't pan out because of political unrest, we found another well-run organization, Friends of Naivasha, who are missionaries are from Nebraska and have built a hospital there.  The long term goal is to train the locals and effectively put the missionaries 'out of business' when the local health care is provided and maintained by Kenyans.

Kenya Team
I

The 2014 team included joining a group called Grace 4 Haiti, organized by Dr. Joe Miller a Family Medicine doctor from Lexington, Nebraska who travels there twice a year.  They join a group called Project Help who has a year round presence in Haiti, working on healthcare, education and infrastructure.

The Haiti Team, April 2014.

Our various trips are documented on the home pages and the adventure continues.
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