Dear Family and Friends,
We have been in the US for the past month, working on some of the many things that are needed to see Mbingo and the training programs progress. God is providing much that we are thankful for.
We continue to work on recruiting more young people to join us in the work at Mbingo. We are encouraged that a young pediatrician and her family are raising support through one of our sister missions to come work long-term at Mbingo. We attended the Global Missions Health Conference in Louisville, KY, and were able to make a number of good contacts for volunteers to come help with the teaching and clinical care. Our greatest need remains to be someone to take over the role of program director for the Internal Medicine residency. We are also looking for nurse practitioners who can help us upgrade our nurse practitioner training.
The Ebola virus outbreak continues to concern all of us at Mbingo. Dennis was able to attend a three day Ebola Safety Training Course offered by the Centers for Disease Control near Atlanta. The training will be very helpful as we continue to prepare our hospitals for a potential outbreak. Therapy for those infected remains mostly supportive, but training our staff to safely care for these patients will be critical. Unfortunately, small errors in the isolation technique can be catastrophic for the caregiver.
We remain amazed at how God is providing the resources to build Mbingo into a referral teaching hospital. The roof is now on both the student hostel building and the new outpatient building. We will begin working with the NAB Foundation on fundraising for the remaining funding for the hydroelectric project. We hope to order the turbine and other components and begin with the preliminary construction after the first of the year.
We continue to be reminded of the importance of these training programs for young African physicians. The graduates of both the surgical and internal medicine residencies are serving in mission hospitals across Cameroon and in other parts of Africa. Some are serving where Western missionaries cannot work, such as in North Cameroon. We were dismayed to hear that one of the surgeons trained in the PAACS program at Banso contracted Ebola while caring for patients in Sierra Leone. He was evacuated to Omaha for treatment in critical condition, but died two days later.
Thank you for your prayers and support this year. Have a great Christmas celebration of God’s love!
Dennis and Nancy