28 Enro 2015
0517 hours
Nueva Capital, Honduras

Mission Honduras LeMars Medical/Dental team 2015.  Wishing all a happy morning.  It was a quiet night for the team.  It was the first night without heavy winds.  It almost seemed balmy in the area I was sleeping on the floor.  It was generally a nice day yesterday.  Sunny and warmer than the day before.  Many of the triage bunch got sun, one or two more than others.  Then about 1600 hours it clouded over, winds came up and it cooled off.  The temperature is currently about 15.2 C or about 59 F.  It is supposed to be similar in temperature to yesterday, or about 77 F.

The patient traffic flow problems encountered the lst day were solved.  Our meeting on Monday evening provided needed solutions.  The day went well.  Since the lst day of school  is Thursday there were many people and kids milling and running around.  This proved to be just a nuisance.  We had 4 members of the Tegucigalpa, Honduras Bomberos helping the team with crowd control.  They also received a number of needed supplies, like nebulizers, sutures, suture trays etc.  They were very happy.  This type of cooperation is needed.  They know most of the people.

The team medical element saw 292 patients and the dental element 64 patients with 104 teeth pulled.  We kept having trouble with keeping enough translators.  All in all, I had to ask 6 patients to return at 0800 hours today to see the doctor because we had no translators. They had to return to the city.  They were understanding.  It should be another day similar to the last two days.  We have used many more tablets of Acetaminophen and vitamins.  I was able to purchase (with Mata Sosa's help) more of each.  Hopefully delivery will be today,  We should have enough of all other medicines.  The diseases here are not the same as in la Montana de la Flor (MDLF) and since this is our lst mission here it was difficult to estimate medicine usage.

The team continued to see cases of lack of food and poor nutrition.  A number of people were referred to Hospital Esquela (the large public hospital in Tegus) for further care.  In some cases $$/limpera's were provided for bus fare and food for the trip.

I will always remember an elderly man, with his elderly wife and I presume a grandchild, that had asthma and needed care.  He was given 2 different nebulizer treatments and other medicines.  He was then given a nebulizer and received instructions on its usage.  The grandchild was instrumental in receiving these instructions.  He was very thankful and seemed without words when he knew it was a gift and he could take it home and use when he needed.  So for all of those that donated nebulizers just remember this elderly man.

I hope to be able to send photos along with this post.  If not we will work on this later today.  The internet is real slow in the evening.  If not I will have Dick send them along.

Thanks again to all.  Have a wonderful day.  I am in the kitchen having coffee and watching the cooks prepare breakfast.   God bless.  Peace to all.

Mr. Francis