First Week

By -

 It has been a busy first week.  God has been faithful to put patients before me that I know are from Him.  There are many others as the word gets out that ENT is here.  It is hard to walk through the hospital without getting stopped numerous times to discuss a Tenwek employees ENT issues or the problems of their family or someone in their tribe.  

When we arrived Sunday afternoon first stop was to the new Eye Dental building.  Here ENT has a clinic room to see patients and store equipment.  The room had been taken over by garbage and animals.  We spent several hours cleaning and putting together the room for clinic on Monday.  Praise God the electrical equipment all works including the SMR unit, chair, and microscope.  

We spent Monday in clinic screening patients for surgery.  I am teaching 2 family practice residents and they are eager to learn and are hard workers.  I am praying that God will work out who is to have surgery as the problems are massive.  Many cancers advanced in staging.  All coming for a cure, no one else has been able to help.  In this culture the oldest son is responsible for the parents so often the sons are bringing in the elderly parents.  

Tuesday early morning I was called to the OR for a young man who was assaulted with a machete causing a deep laceration in the front of the neck. The surgical residents were exploring the wound and noted that the voice box and airway had been injured.  The injuries were all repairable and he is healing well on the ward.  It never fails to impress me how the Lord brings these kinds of injuries in when there is the right specialist available!

I spent Wednesday removing a cancerous mass from this patient's salivary gland.  Another surgeon had attempted to remove the tumor and it recurred quickly.  We worked a big part of the day meticulously removing the tumor and sparing the nerve that moves the face.  She did well and is home recovering now.


I have also operated on a young women who looks like she has TB and an advanced cancer of the voice box.  She is on the wards and we are awaiting culture results and biopsy reports.  please pray for her this is serious and life threatening.

My last surgery on Friday was a 17 year old female with a large mass in her neck.  We explored the neck without any biopsy or CT scan results to save her money.  We were grateful to see that this was a large benign cyst that was easily removed.  She was discharged this morning.  For those that like the details photo below!

The last thing to mention is COVID.  Yes it is here.  we have had 49 cases, 12 deaths, and recent hospital staff have become positive.  Please pray for our protection!

Thank you for your prayers.  I could not do this without the strength of the Lord.  I give Him all the Glory.  He leads us in paths of righteousness for His name's sake!!

Chase and Jimmy


Popular posts from this blog

Arrived home

By -
Image
 We arrived back home safely for Easter!  Thank you for all your prayers.  This trip was a tough one but God proved Himself faithful as always.  God answered prayers in so many ways. 1. He poured forth rain from heaven.  The drought has ended and the people are rejoicing in the plentiful rains on the country. Compare this to week one photo of the waterfall at Tenwek.  The rains have allowed the hydroelectric plant to run again.  The fields are green again! 2. He healed His people physically!  This patient has TB of the spine.  She was paralyzed from the waist down and unable to sit up in bed.  Her arms were weak.  She underwent incision and drainage of a soft tissue abscess and spine stabilization.  I helped with the access in the neck for the neurosurgery team. She is now able to sit up in a wheel chair and strength is returning to her arms.  This is beyond what we could have hoped.  God is working His miracles. 3. He is healing His people spiritually.  This patient came in through ca
Read more

First Week

By -
Image
 I arrived safely after an arduous journey.  I did get questioned at customs again and needed to pay a Tarif but it was a reasonable rate this time.  I have been without internet until yesterday so I apologize for a late update. My first week was quite busy in clinic as I screened patients for upcoming surgeries.  We has some late nights but it is great to be back serving the Kenyans.  I have performed multiple biopsies on various tumors.  Unfortunately there is no pathologist here so the biopsies can take up to 3 weeks for results.  We will make daily calls to try to move up the cases urgently. This patient was ecstatic!  He was diagnosed with severe hearing loss in both ears.  I fit him with a digital hearing aid and he was able to hear clear for the first time in years!  They live 5 hours away and were so blessed! This is a typical thyroid goiter for this region.  She underwent evaluation of her vocal cords in preparation for upcoming surgery.  This will be a tough one to be done al
Read more

Chebonei Girls High School

By -
Image
Classrooms at Chebonei Girls High School We were recently invited to the Chebonei Girls High School to see if we could help them with water filtration.  We set up (2) 100 liter tanks (25-gallons each) and put two filters in each tank and then drilled another 5 pails that will collect the clean water with faucets.  They've been purchasing cases upon cases of bottled water, which gets very expensive, for their drinking water.  They have 2 large rain tanks that are currently empty, but they do have some water that is tapped in from the hospital, but the volume is not adequate and it is not always safe to drink.  They will now transport some water up from the river and use the filters to clean it. The school houses up to 507 high school girls ages 14-18 years old.  Hunter has visited them for games and was part of a devotional team that brought a message and did praise and worship music for them.  It is a Christian School, but not all are necessarily 'Believers' - they
Read more