Today was a very busy day. We left our hotel at 7:30 AM and didn't get back until after 7:00 PM. We traveled with a speech therapy team from Washington State University to the town of Morales, which does not have rehabilitation services. We set up a clinic in a covered play field (like a gym without all four walls). Local community advocates had let people know that we would be there and word also spread after we arrived. When we arrived, there were already patients waiting to see us. We set up our tables and got to work. And boy did we work! Together, we saw 28 patients! That is a lot for one day. Some of the people we saw waited patiently in a hot covered ball field all day to see us. We saw patients with strokes, back pain, rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis, neck pain, and more. About a third of the patients we saw were children. Families brought their children with significant physical and communication disorders to see us. Most of them were not going to school and were not being seen by a doctor. None of them were receiving any rehabilitation. My two favorite kids were a nine year old girl who could stand with supervision, but could not walk, and a 15 year old boy who was cared for by his sister and her husband. He looked younger than Evan, and he also couldn't walk and had to be carried by them. We didn't have walkers for children, but we modified an adult walker for the girl and she walked for the first time! The organization I am working with will get a pediatric walker for her, but for now, she can still walk with the adult walker! Imagine how excited she was. We measured the boy for a wheelchair and hopefully he will receive it soon. That will make a big difference for him, too. These kids and many others were also seen by the speech therapy team, and it was amazing to see the team help the kids and parents learn ways to communicate with each other. They made communication boards, communication bags (with tools for therapy the parents could do), and binders with instructions for Guatemalan sign language. It must make a huge difference in the families' lives.
My students were terrific. They worked all day with only about a 10-minute lunch break. It was hot and hard work, but they gave just as much attention to the last patients as they did to the first. What a day! Here are a few pictures.
This is the little girl who is walking for the first time!
Hot, tired, but satisfied at the end of our day.
A picture from our trip home.
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