Community Health: Working With My Papua New Guinean Colleagues

     We open the back doors of the Land Rover-turned-ambulance and pull out our supplies. A goodly number of mothers and kids are beginning to gather under the trees and in the grass around the ambulance. Out come the scales, the umbrellas and tables and the basic medical kit and medication and vaccine boxes. Now, we’re ready. Community Health Clinic is now open.  First I help the ambulance driver check in and weigh the various children and infants that will be seen by our team today. Each wriggling baby that bounces in the hanging sling scale or little wide eyed kiddo that stands on the scale in bare brown toes is so precious to me. It’s at these clinics that I remember why I’m here. It’s the people of Papua New Guinea that have captured my heart. I love them so deeply and want so much to be a blessing to them as they are to me.

    Soon all the kids are weighed and I go around the back of the ambulance to get ready for the next wave of work. My next job will be to carry out the orders my coworkers have written for each patient. For some it will be medications, others will need wound care and others will need vaccinations. Soon the health books start piling up and I’m frantically trying to keep up with the flow of patients. Giving shots here, instructions on medications there. More and more come and soon I find a rhythm to my work. After a while I’m joined by one of my Papua New Guinean coworkers and we work together to finish the orders. In no time we find the stack of books has vanished and we pack up our gear and head back to the clinic.

    We pile out of the ambulance and put back the supplies. It’s a little before noon so I decide to jump in and help in the dispensary in the Papua New Guinean side of the clinic. I unlock the door, slip inside and open the dispensary window. Hands immediately reach out, green prescription slips extended. I start to count pills, fill orders and give instructions. A mama with her infant comes for antibiotics for her baby’s cough. An elderly man comes for ibuprofen for his aching joints. Another dad comes for eye ointment for his son’s infected eye. And the list goes on. Soon the noon horn floats over the center and the crowd slowly thins until the clinic door is closed. I put away the various bags and bottle and tidy up before closing and locking the door. It may feel like a small way to serve the clinic but it’s a tangible one. Today has been a good day. I praise God once again that He lets me work alongside Papua New Guinean brothers and sisters that delight in serving the Lord and in reaching out to others with the love of Christ through health care.

Me and my coworker Rhona on our way to a Community Health Clinic in a nearby village.  She's such a precious sister in Christ and a constant encouragement to me!