Flying to work!

This week I began flying to work in the mountains.  I am in a handover 'learning' period with Lesotho Flying Doctor Service (LFDS). You might notice TWO things on the logo.  One is that it is 'doctor' not 'doctors'.  LFDS began over 25 years ago when a missionary doctor pilot who saw the vast spiritual and medical needs in the mountains began flying there to provide health care and evangelism.  LFDS has matured now to the point where it is a part of the Lesotho Ministry of Health and a key component to providing comprehensive health care in the mountains.   But it still has only one doctor.  We do have many other staff that make up the team.  The second thing you might notice is that right in the middle of the logo is 'MAF'.  Mission Aviation Fellowship (MAF) is what makes LFDS "flying" and not Lesotho Walking Doctor Service.  Sally and I are so blessed to work with the MAF team (more on MAF in another blog).  They are a great group of pilots and mechanics that love the Lord and are committed to an excellent flying program.    On Monday the "Doctor Team" (myself, a nurse, an ophthalmic nurse, and a dental technician) flew about 30 minutes into the mountains to a village health center called Lebakeng to provide health care. Patients had been scheduled to come that day to see our team. 

     The next day MAF pilot Christiann Haak flew myself and the Primary Health Care team to a small village called Matekane.  Our team on Tuesday consisted of a nurse who is trained as a midwife and in public health, a nurse assistant and myself.  Matekane Health Post is not a clinic, but a health post that is run on a twice monthly basis by LFDS.  

We use the house of a local pastor to run the clinic.   We saw 25 women that day, about half for family planning and half for pre-natal care, and then 22 of their babies/kids for health check and immunizations.  Lesotho is quite advanced in it's immunization program providing the latest suggested vaccines for it's kids!  

      Well, I kinda got ahead of myself.  After landing at Matekane, 

we walked over to the house and found just a couple of women there.  We waited for about half an hour and by then there were about 20 women with their children tied on their backs.  They wait to hear the plane fly over and then they start walking from their villages to the health post.  The Public Health/Midwife Nurse then began health education discussion, explaining to them the new program that will provide cervical cancer screening, some discussion about breast cancer, and discussion about HIV/AIDS.  Me' Phomane ('may poh-money') is quite passionate about her teaching and the ladies really participated with a lot of great questions.

       After that it was time to start weighing babies, giving injections, and 

examining and counseling women who were pregnant or were trying not to get pregnant.  Me' Leonia (teal colored shirt) loves the kids and is so good at giving injections.  She was assisted by a village health worker Me' Balantyne (red vest).

   As a village health worker Me' Balantyne helps to mobilize the women in her village and surrounding area to attend the free pre-natal and immunization services as well as doing teaching about HIV/AIDS.  Just recently the Ministry of Health began a program to provide a small incentive to Village Health Workers consisting of about $3/month. 

     Well, we finished our work around 3:30PM in time for MAF

 Pilot Christiann to come and pick us up.  As we took off from the grass airstrip, we could see two women by heaps of wheat hand thrashing it.  The harvest was pretty good this year as they had decent rains. Praise God for good harvest.

      Today I went to Manamaneng Health Center.

It is one of the Health Centers in the mountains that Partners in Health (PIH) is working with LFDS to provide HIV/AIDS services.  I'll share more about PIH and LFDS work in a later blog.   I was blessed to work with a Mosutu doctor (George) who had just been posted to Manamaneng last week.  The health center has a small staff of LFDS and PIH employees that provide the day-to-day care in the clinic.  They really care about their patients.  The clinic serves about 12,000 people from the surrounding villages.  LFDS not only provides full time staff at the clinic but is responsible for getting the drugs/supplies/coal to the clinic.  How does it get there you ask?  MAF under contract from the Ministry of Health airlifts it there through the MAF/LFDS program.  

   By the time MAF pilot Justin Hanoker came to get us the winds had picked up and we were taking off with a 15 knot quartering tail wind.  He did a great job getting us safely back to our base in Maseru at the airstrip that MAF shares with the Lesotho Air Defense Services. 

   The 'doctor team' heads to the mountains again tomorrow and then we are off for Easter weekend. Sally and I head to Johannesburg, South Africa for our mission's annual meeting.  Meanwhile, every day Sally and I work on our language study and cultural learning.  Boy we have a long way to go...