Since the founding of Medical Missionaries in 1997, through April 2019, much has been accomplished in our 3 areas of focus: providing aid and disaster relief in the USA; international shipments of medical supplies; and improving health care in Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
Aid For the Poor in the US:
Medical Missionaries has helped those in need in the USA. Every month, we provide over a dozen local deliveries of clothing and medical equipment to people living nearby and a number of assisted-living facilities. Winter coats were delivered to the homeless of Washington DC and to a local school with a high population of poor children.
In West Virginia we have delivered over 200 truckloads of household goods and food. We have expanded this program by delivering truckloads of food, baby supplies, and household goods to other areas of Appalachia including southwest Virginia, and eastern Kentucky.
Donations of new clothing, school supplies, hygiene products, and sporting goods have been delivered to the American Indian schools on Reservations including the Cherokee in Oklahoma, the Chippewa in Wisconsin, the Navajo and Hopi in Arizona, the Sioux in South Dakota, the Northern Cheyenne and Crow in Montana, and the Athabascan natives in Alaska. Supplies and household furnishings were donated to the Hungarian child refugee camp in upstate New York.
For International Shipments of Humanitarian Aid:
Medical Missionaries provides humanitarian aid internationally, sending medical supplies and equipment and household goods to those in need. Almost two hundred 40-foot sea containers have been sent to countries including: Senegal, Guinea, Malawi, Sierra Leone, Guinea Bissau, Liberia, Benin, Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Cameroon, Central Africa Republic, Congo, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, Kenya, Zambia, Yemen, Syria, Haiti, Dominican Republic, Argentina, Philippines, Ghana, Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, and Ukraine.
We have supported 120 medical mission teams on 900+ overseas missions, providing them with over 2500 boxes of medicines and supplies. Those teams have served the healthcare needs of the poor in El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, Peru, Venezuela, St Lucia, Mexico, Belize, Haiti, Dominican Republic, Jamaica, Argentina, Sudan, Lebanon, Philippines, Vietnam- leper colony, Burma, Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, and Ukraine.
Over the years, we have acquired facilities for acquisition, storage and shipment of healthcare and household supplies overseas: two box trucks, two sea containers, three mobile trailers, 8 truck trailers, and two pickup trucks.
Providing Disaster Relief in the USA and Worldwide:
We have provided direct assistance, sending relief supplies for those affected by the following disasters: 1998 – Hurricane George, Dominican Republic; 2001 – Post 9/11, an emergency triage trailer to NYC; 2004 – Tsunami, Sri Lanka; 2005 – Hurricane Katrina; 2010 – Haiti earthquake; 2011 – Tornadoes, Alabama; 2012 – Hurricane Sandy, New Jersey; 2016 – Floods, Rainel, WV; 2016 – Floods, Ponchatoula, LA; 2016 Floods, Albemarle, North Carolina; 2017 – Hurricane Harvey, Port Arthur, TX; 2016 – Hurricane Irma, Immokalee, FL; 2018 – Hurricane Florence, Raleigh, NC; 2018 – Hurricane Michael, Lumberton, NC.
Improving Healthcare for the Poor in the Dominican Republic and Haiti:
In the Dominican Republic:
Working with the Arlington Diocese Mission in Banica, Dominican Republic, Medical Missionaries helped build a healthcare infrastructure for the residents of this rural area, including: built a storage facility for supplies sent from the US; bought three sea containers for additional storage; provided 1 school bus; provided 4 army trucks; renovated a building for use as a dental office; bought a diesel farm tractor; created a rural village communication system; sent a child to the US for heart surgery.
For six years, Medical Missionaries delivered supplemental food supplies to the poor in mountain villages outside of Banica, under a grant from USAID.
In Haiti:
- In Thomassique, Haiti, Medical Missionaries built St. Joseph Clinic. After 10 years of planning and construction, the Clinic opened in June, 2007. It is the only healthcare facility for a region of approximately 125,000 people. The Clinic treats about 25,000 patients each year and assists about 450 births per year at the Clinic itself. Its Maternity and ER facilities are open 24/7. In addition, Clinic professionals have trained traditional birth attendants (“Matwons”) who assist another 1400 home births per year.
Medical Missionaries sends medical, dental, and surgical teams several times each year to support the professional Haitian staff at the Clinic and provide on-going professional education. Some of the visiting teams have also provided training to nurses at the University of Notre Dame Nursing school in nearby Hinche, the Departmental capitol.
Clinic health services extend far beyond the confines of the Clinic compound, and include disease prevention programs:
- Community Health Centers in six outlying villages, staffed by a trained Community Health Worker and overseen by a Community Health Committee chosen by each village
- Multiple mass immunization programs children, with vaccines for MMR, Hepatiis A and B, Hemophilis influenza, Pneumococcal pneumonia, and DPT
- Medika Mamba (peanut butter ready-to-use nutritional supplement fortified with vitamins and oils) saves the lives of more than 100 children per year
- A Cholera Treatment Center, established with help from Doctors Without Borders following the 2010 earthquake, treats patients suffering from diarrhea and cholera
- Klorfasil, a chlorine-based water purification system, has been installed in more than 9,000 homes
- More than 1,000 students receive a hot lunch daily at six schools involved in our School Lunch Program, offered in cooperation from Feed My Starving Children
- Bon Sel, a fortified salt product, is being used to eradicate lymphatic filariasis, hypothyroidism, and delayed brain development in young children
- Through continuing community education, Clinic staff educates the communities in good hygiene, disease prevention, and healthy prenatal and postnatal care.
- In 2015, the Clinic started a pilot “Dental Hygiene” program to teach students in one school good dental hygiene
Providing Education on Third World Medicine:
Medical Missionaries has organized and hosted four major educational conferences for medical professionals and persons interested in learning more about working in Third World countries. Speakers included nationally recognized authorities from the National Institute for Health, Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, various universities, and Medical Missionaries professionals with field experience.