FEB-A-4
LETTER OF AUTHORIZATION
FOR PARTICIPANTS IN THE
“MEDICAL MISSION TO
MALAWI-‘03”
DRAFT LETTER FOR JOINT
SIGNATURE OF GEORGE POEHLMAN AND I
IN SUPERVISION OF THE
TWO TEAMS OF MEDICAL VOLUNTEERS
February 6, 2003
Dear Jodi:
Thank you for your patience, as I have been operating on a
medical mission to Mindanao with Medical Ministries international, and have
only recently returned. I have just had a long conversation with George, who
will submit this communication form both of us, regarding our division of the
responsibility for the continuing help we would like to provide to the CCPA and
Embangweni and affiliated health centers. George has already mailed to you his
first half of the mission and his itinerary with the IAD departure on Saturday,
April 5 for the BA arrival in Malawi on Sunday 4/6. Along with him will come
John Sutter and Amy Hayes, both veterans of previous medical missions with me,
and each will be carrying a large box of supplies for Embangweni that I am
gathering for them.
George has already received the letter you furnished to
Yael for him and his team accompanying him, and you have the ticketing
information for the flights in hand for them.
George will be working on the planning grant of $15,000 and
has enlisted the supervision of Alex, Ducasani and Ishmael in helping the
supervision of John and Amy. He will then be leaving with John on the Sunday
4/21 BA flight coming out, whereas Amy will be remaining for an additional
week, and will be there in Embangweni when I arrive for her supervision and
that of three other accompanying persons. She will be leaving at the end of
April, and I had planned to remain with the other three persons in my group
until around May 13 for a total of three weeks within the constraints of the
airline connections that can be made.
IT IS IMPORTANT FOR EACH PERSON TO REALIZE THAT AN
IMPORTANT PART OF THEIR ASSIGNMENT IN THIS MISSION IS TO CARRY ONE COMPLETE BAG
AS CHECKED IN LUGGAGE OF THE MEDICINES, SURGICAL SUPPLIES AND SUTURE, ETC, AND
JOURNALS AND BOOKS FOR THE EMBANGWENI LIBRARY THAT I HAVE BEEN CCUMULATING TO
AID THE EMBANGWENI MISSION. No one of our
accredited group leaves for Malawi without carrying one complete bag of their
two bag check-in allowance with supplies for the mission!
My group will be leaving from IAD with the second wave, and that will be as soon after April 22 as Yael can arrange these flights. In my group will be I, Virginia Croskery, Harolyn Johnson, and Kevin Bergman.
You already know me, and I will probably institutionalize
my credentials at Embangweni in order to keep this exchange sustainable. I am
qualified, licensed, boarded, and a veteran of forty years of international
medical missions. My commitments to the Presbyterian Mission station in the
footsteps of David Livingstone are also well known to you.
Virginia Croskery, daughter of a Presbyterian minister and
veteran of several medical missions, including several I have led, is a very
special person, which you will realize upon meeting her. She will have a
special interest in the Deaf Choir, and the church singing, but has been a
general organizer, as she has proven by overhauling and managing the pharmacy
on my Himalayan medical missions.
Harolyn Johnson, a very devoted support to ALL the GWU
medical students, has arranged all the international elective rotations with
me, and will be a linchpin in the further sustainability of this connection,
which we hope to institutionalize.
Kevin Bergman is a superb, mature senior medical student at
GWUMC, and my handpicked man who accompanied me on a previous Himalayan medical
mission to Ladakh. I vouch for him and all other participants in the mission as
each has worked closely with me under a wide variety of circumstances and
venues---ALL are veterans of foreign missions I have led.
This will be Virginia's, Harolyn's (and a very special
"homecoming"), and Kevin's first trip to Africa. I have spent two and
a half years of my professional life in
Africa, a full year of which was in Southern Africa in 1996 (including Malawi)
Senior Fulbright Scholar for African Regional Health Research and Humanitarian
Aid.
Through the recruiting efforts of John Sutter who has
enthusiastically reported his prior Malawi experience with me, two pediatric
residents, Drs. Chen and Kiang, from National Children’s Hospital Medical
Center, an affiliate of GWU, have received leave and support to participate in
the health care efforts in Malawi. I met with Dr. Chen. I believe they might be
ideally deployed in the centers that are affiliated with Embangweni, according
to the suggestions of George Poehlman including the hospital at Melangi, and
through the confections of Adam Kushner in Lilongwe in the pediatrics
department there.
I plan to visit some of the other centers, perhaps taking
one or more students with me, such as Msuzu and Ekwandeni, but with principle
allegiance to Embangweni where each of us will be based.
There is no need for my supervision of Dr. Adam Kushner,
who is a finished product of the surgical training programs, and he has been productively
deployed in Lilongwe, and a similar arrangement can be employed for the
pediatric residents under the authority of the respective departments of
pediatrics as Adam has affiliated with the surgery department. I had encouraged
him by email acquaintance on referral from American College of Surgeons friends
for my familiarity and expertise in the area to visit and assist Embangweni if
it became possible for him to do so, but this was not thought of as his primary
billet.
A future volunteer of a graduate physician not yet enrolled
in an OB residency is Kay May Kwok, who may be available for an extended period
of time after July or 2003. She will be a GWU graduate at that time and beyond
my role as a supervisor, but the details of this association can be worked out
as we are there, and will be a principle activity of Harolyn Johnson who will
be liaison in such matters.
I had promised the future participation of superb gifted
senor surgeons, such as that of Dr. Craig J. Schaefer, a former GWU surgical
resident of mine and close colleague and associate. His partner, Dr. William
Bair is also available for a future volunteer term, although certainly not both
together. We had arranged a promotion of a medical mission within the hospital
where they work in Cambridge Maryland, which continues to be a principle
supplier of some of the medical and surgical equipment I have procured, as is
true also through the good offices of Chona Hamrock in Anne Arundel Medical
Center newborn nursery, and especially my friends at Nonin Medical, Inc., who
were the source of the pulse oximeter donated last year when I carried it to
Embangweni. Such donations in kind and in talent are what I would like to
facilitate and encourage to continue.
Please furnish the required letter for Yael to begin the
ticketing process for the four of us in the second wave, as you had for the
three in the first wave, and forward these plans for our volunteering our
services under the overall supervision of Dr. Ngwira, with whom we had
discussed this ongoing relationship in my meeting with him last year. We are
responsible for the supervision and educational activity of the program we seek
to give to Malawi, but are not seeking to, nor should we accept, the authority
and responsibility of the medical superintendents or evangelical mission under
whom we serve and for whom we seek to support.
Thank you for this opportunity to serve, and we hope it
might continue to be a very positive experience for each who are involved,
above all the Malawian patients whom we come to serve.
Glenn W. Geelhoed
Candice Chen and Michelle
Kiang (peds residents) are arriving in Malawi on March 30 and
departing Malawi on April
20.
What should we do to
facilitate/arrange transport from Lilongwe to Embagweni?
thanks,
Michelle
>>> "Jodi
& Jim McGill" <mcgill@africa-online.net> 02/04/03 09:36PM
>>>
Dear Glen,
Time is getting close for
your visit and we need to know the completed
schedules and quantities of
people for your
trip out. I have gone back through various emails and
pieced together the
following but some of the
messages are on another computer. Could you please
modify/correct and send
back? We have several other people visiting the
institutions and we don't
want unnecessary overlap at nor neglect of an
institution.
1. John Sutter (?specialty,
4th yr student) April 1(?leaving USA or arriving
Malawi)
2. Candice Chen and
Michelle Kiang (ped residents) 30 March or 6 April
(which date and again, is
that leaving or arriving?)
3. Glen, Virginia, Harolyn,
& Amy (4th yr student) April 23-? May
4. What is the role, if any
now, of Adam Kushner?
5. My understanding is that
George P. is NOT available for supervision. Does
this change anything?
6. What kind of supervision
do the residents require? Would people be
willing and interested in
going to one of our other sister hospitals?
Please write and indicate
names, dates of arrival in Malawi and departure
from Embangweni. Additionally let us know about number 4, 5,
and 6.
Thank you,
Jodi