Transfigurations
Glynn, Kevin P.
TRANSFIGURATIONS With a surgical team in Mexico Kevin P. Glynn It's been said if one wants to see the face of God, look at the simple beauty of a child. But what if that face has been...
...Some of the local citizens had difficulty believing that the group had no ulterior motive, wasn't seeking to convert anyone, and expected nothing in return...
...But since M.O.S.T...
...First, members of the San Diego Rotary Club scout appropriate locations, politick for local support, and provide financial assistance...
...Nevertheless there are plenty of volunteers for M.O.S.T...
...for one last try...
...And how ought we to respond...
...Further, local authorities resent their citizens being used for training American doctors, and so M.O.S.T...
...In February my wife and I were privileged to participate in a trip to the interior of Mexico with a group known as M.O.S.T...
...Indeed if there is any risk for the crew it's not hardship but pride because team members are treated like celebrities, with TV coverage, gifts, and community adulation...
...And how ought we to respond...
...The comments of one young girl summarized the overall impact of the team...
...Then local doctors and hospital administrators have to be persuaded to turn over their clinics, operating rooms, and post-op recovery areas to these strangers for a week, and accept the disruptions to their own work schedules...
...There was no room on the schedule and we could only invite him to return the next time the team comes to Uruapan...
...The local physicians and officials appreciate the help, but sometimes seem embarrassed that they aren't able to take care of their own people from their own resources...
...The plastic surgeon closed the hole in his palate but had to tell his mother that the chances of its holding were very low and the problems would likely persist...
...originated in 1987 when a group of nurses from Mercy Hospital (now Scripps Mercy) in San Diego formed teams to travel to the interior of Mexico to operate on children with various deformities...
...to get to the hospital, operates until 7 or 8 P.M., goes back to the hotel for a bottle of cervesa and collapses until the next morning...
...The limiting factor is usually how many operating tables the local hospital will commit...
...Mercy Outreach Surgical Team...
...Years of gradually accumulated successes were needed before parents would begin to trust their children to the strangers...
...Commonweal 16 July 16,1999...
...On a typical day, everyone rises at 5:30 a.m...
...Marines from Camp Pendleton bring in cots and take care of the patients and families in the parish hall of Saint John's Church, two miles from the hospital...
...As I write this story I am visualizing the disappointment on the face of a father who brought his son to the screening clinic...
...Furthermore, the Mexican government has to be enlisted to give its ongoing support...
...One little boy had bilateral cleft lips and palate with carious upper teeth growing forward from his gums...
...Fourteen physicians, sixteen nurses, and eighteen support personnel journeyed from San Diego, California, to Uruapan, about two hundred miles west of Mexico City in the foothills of the Sierra Madre Occidental mountains...
...And sometimes I simply washed instruments or just held crying babies to soothe them on the way to the operating room...
...Can we find God's handiwork manifest in such grotesque accidents...
...Even though she's been out of professional nursing for several decades while she's raised our children, her experienced calmness in dealing with sick patients who were vomiting, or spitting up blood, reassured the lay volunteers assigned to the area with her...
...The youngster had a severe burn scar that had fused his upper arm to his chest wall so that he had no motion of the shoulder or elbow...
...Kevin P. Glynn, M.D., is president of the medical staff at Scripps Mercy Hospital in San Diego, California...
...Since many of the staff aren't Catholic, as soon as he went to sleep a theological discussion began about the efficacy of the beads, but there was no debate about his motivation—and all appreciated the gifts...
...For every three patients accepted, one has to be turned away, not because the problem is too severe to tackle, but because there is a limit to the number of cases that can be done in a week...
...Many of these children have such severe deformities that they have been hidden even from neighbors...
...work on their children...
...The nurses give up vacation time to make the trips...
...The second lesson is the benefit of giving to the giver...
...Another teen-ager who had previously undergone reconstruction of a cleft lip and palate came to have his nose reduced...
...Attempts had been made to repair the defects several times previously and he came to M.O.S.T...
...As he was climbing on the operating table he gave rosaries to the surgeon, scrub nurse, and anesthesiologist...
...But I was also pressed into service to spell assistant surgeons or nurses who needed a break...
...Local priests have contributed in this regard by persuading the understandably suspicious Indians to let M.O.S.T...
...has avoided the temptation to use the outreach surgical team for teaching purposes...
...Then twice each year the team flies off to Mexico and spends a week operating on children who have been brought in from the impoverished countryside...
...Her brother clung to her leg, cried when he saw the intravenous line inserted, and followed her to the vestibule of the operating room until the nurses restrained him...
...For this, Rotarians fly the children and parents to San Diego, and hospital staff devote a Saturday to mending their disfigurements...
...We all knew the boy probably wouldn't survive much longer...
...Some institutions have seen similar efforts founder because they have tried to operate with less than their first team...
...goes to so many towns, it may be several years before that happens...
...But what if that face has been deformed by a cleft lip, or burn scars stretch over its surface...
...Nada," was the response...
...These days she enjoys traveling around the countryside, because, in her own words, "now, I am beautiful...
...The Commonweal 15 July 16,1999 scouts and team members try their best to be polite, since one arrogant comment can neutralize hundreds of hours of diplomatic effort...
...My job was to deal with complications, such as fevers, unexpected heart murmurs, pulmonary congestion, or in one case, a collapsed lung...
...When such deformities have been repaired, the nose itself is commonly left broad and flat like a pig's snout, requiring later revision...
...My wife worked in post-op...
...is a small group and has only a tiny effect in a country as populous as Mexico, but its efforts have improved life for the several thousand children operated on over the last ten years and have enriched the souls of team members nearly as much...
...team straightened and released...
...The idea for M.O.S.T...
...energetic support staff who get the job done without being asked...
...He was choking on food and was underweight...
...A sixteen-year-old girl was burned on her face and arms saving her little brother when their house caught fire...
...may be among the best, it's not unique...
...Its operation, however, is complex...
...There are many such volunteer groups scattered around the United States, and while M.O.S.T...
...At Uruapan the team did 217 procedures in four days, ranging in severity from simple repair of cleft lips to complex flap rotations for burn scars...
...The doctors leave their practices and pay their own expenses...
...Members of the local Rotary Club arrange for hotel accommodations, and every day club wives outdo one another to prepare lunches for the group...
...What lessons do the visits teach...
...After eleven surgical procedures, her left hand was a contracted claw, which the M.O.S.T...
...I was the internal medicine "sweeper...
...Some of the problems are too complicated to be repaired locally, and so an annual "Mercy Day" is held in San Diego in late September...
...There are some disappointments...
...She had undergone repair of disfiguring facial burn scars on an earlier trip and was returning for a final revision...
...The most difficult times for the team, however, come on the first day, when clinics are held to select the cases...
...The third lesson is the display of endurance and trust...
...One doctor took an American colleague aside and asked him how much the U.S...
...M.O.S.T...
...Much of M.O.S.T.'s success relates to the fact that the staff is made up of "pros": senior surgeons with skill and judgment, competent nurses ministering to sick children, and Can we find God's handiwork manifest in a cleft lip or burn scars...
...That's a month's work for an average-size general hospital in the United States...
...government was subsidizing the team...
...Though the lower half of her face was rough with leathery scars, she was a beautiful young woman whose trusting vulnerability endeared her to all who cared for her...
...And like the United States, Mexico has a long tradition of maltreating its native population...
...To see the imploring looks on the parents' faces and to see the deformities left untreated breaks one's heart...
...First is the value of teamwork...
...The last night before departure, they treat team members to a colorful fiesta with lots of music, demonstrations of local dances, and sampling of various tequila drinks so that the spirit of camaraderie infects even the most shy...
...Further, the group purposely seeks out the children of Indians and others who live at the margins of their society...
...While the focus is on the efforts of the plastic surgeons and pediatric orthopedists, they would fail without the contributions of every person on board, and the institutions back in the United States...
...She told the nurse in pre-op that previously she would hide inside her house...
...We had three plastic surgeons, three orthopedists, a urologist, a general surgeon, and five pediatric anesthesiologists...
...His lower jaw was underdeveloped which made him look like a rodent...
...The Indians' trust is earned slowly...
Vol. 126 • July 1999 • No. 13
