While the site is being designed and built, feel free to browse the tags to the right, or the categories to the left, and explore topics that relate to the Guatemalan way of life.
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Welcome to the Clinic Link blog. Clinic Link is a 501(c)(3), non-profit organization (IRS Determination Letter), whose central activity is to create a free website devoted to improving the health potential of the Guatemalan people. The site will contain tools to help traveling medical missions, Guatemalan NGO’s, and development groups to work better, together.
Leonel Culan is 37 years old. On December 3rd while he was working as a builder’s assistant he fell 3 meters off a rock wall. His life changed forever and he became a parapalegic. Leonel is in the hospital in Solola. He is depressed about his own situation and terribly worried about how his family will survive. He lives in San Lucas Toliman and has seven children. His wife is Marta Elisa, 33yrs old. She did not have the chance to go to school and does not know how to read or write. She washes clothes by hand in private houses and earns $8 US per week when she can get the work. The money that the family is now earning is not enough for them to cover their costs. Often they have to go into the mountains and find herbs to eat. Their main diet now is tortillas with salt. They own the house they live in. It is in very bad shape. They have one room made of cement block. They have one dilapidated kitchen made of tin. They pay $7 US per month for electricity. They do not have water connected and have to go to the lake to bring drinking water and wash their clothes. The lake is now suffering pollution and people are advised not to drink from it but this family cannot afford to buy drinking water. They do not have an onil stove. They cook over a wood burning stove. They have two chairs. They have one table. They have two beds but it is a hard plank bed that does not have a mattress. The other bed is a wire base but they do not have any mattress. They do not have drainage. They have not been able to afford to connect the water or to buy a pila, which is a 2 sided sink and an essential part of a Guatemalan household. The father will be released from the hospital shortly and his situation is very desperate. The family does not have enough to eat. The living conditions are very unsanitary. They need beds, food, clothing, the floor needs cementing, they need the water connected and they need to have a water filter. The father will need medical support if he is going to be able to survive with the care that he will receive at home. This family was living very hand to mouth before this accident but now their situation is very, very difficult. If anyone can help with any of these needs for this family, it would be a huge blessing for them. If you have any suggestions for this family, please contact Sharon Smart-Poage at Sharon@MayanFamilies.org.
Coxjac School Latrine Project: This is a project to construct three latrines for a school system in rural Guatemala. The process will also incorporate lessons involving the environment and waste management, hygiene and sanitation, and construction techniques and teamwork. The project is being carried out in Coxjac, Totonicapan, Guatemala, under the direction of Peace Corps Volunteer Casey Kittredge. The latrines will be used by three groups of students who use the school (elementary, middle school and a weekend middle school program) for a total of 240 students and 12 teachers. The current bathrooms have been deemed unsanitary by the Department of Health due to their proximity to the area where the atol, the morning snack, is prepared for the elementary students. La Cruz Water Project: This project is to build a 1200 liter rainwater catchment tank, with an accompanying hand washing station, at an elementary school in La Cruz, Cajola, Quetzaltenango. The tank will hold a 2-week supply of water for the 285 students that attend the school. The Escuela Oficial Rural Mixta has little access to water, consisting of a small chorro that receives water once a week for an hour. The young students currently bring water in 2-liter bottles from their homes or the local stream to school in order to sustain the water supply. Water Charity is pleased to be participating with other NGOs in this project, and their funds will go for skilled labor and materials. The community and parents from the school are contributing additional labor, and will maintain the tank and pipes upon completion. Santa Apolonia Composting Latrines Project: This is a project to build composting latrines in Santa Apolonia, Chimaltenango. It is being carried out under the direction of Peace Corps Volunteer Ellen Ostrow. In the municipality of Santa Apolonia, Ellen works with two rural agricultural communities, Chuaparal—an indigenous population—and Cojulya—a primarily Ladino population. Over half of the 47 families in the two groups do not have latrines. For those that do, the latrines, which often serve for more than one family, are in poor condition and do little to aid fecal control. The communities are plagued by chronic diarrhea and other gastrointestinal diseases. The groups have requested a community latrine project, which will benefit a combined 300 men, women, and children. Ellen is part of the Rural Home Preventive Health project, Peace Corps Guatemala. Volunteers are partnered with local health centers in various municipalities. Each health center reports to departmental level health centers which then report to the ministry of health. Julio Verne School Project of Melanie Reda: Melanie Reda is a Peace Corps Volunteer, working in Aldea Saquiya, Municipio of Patzún, Chimaltenango. She is undertaking a project to construct a water deposit, and install eight faucets and three flushable toilets at the Julio Verne Elementary School. Kristen Petros’s Water Tank Project: Kristen Petros is a Peace Corps Volunteer living near Patulup, El Quiche’. The local elementary school has 65 students, from pre-primary through sixth grade. The school receives no water during daytime hours. Water is needed for drinking, food preparation, hand washing, and cleaning. Katie Bovitz, Volunteer in Paraje El Zapote: Katie Bovitz is a Peace Corps Volunteer, serving in Paraje El Zapote, Pachilip in the Municipality of Joyabaj, Department of Quiche. She is serving under a 9 month extension to her original Peace Corps commitment of two years. Katie will be leaving Guatemala in April, and asked if Water Charity could fund a last project she wanted to do before she left. After reviewing her proposal, they committed to the project, within her timetable. They told her to start acquiring the materials, as the funds are on their way. In 2008, Katie raised money to build a two-room elementary schoolhouse in the village of El Zapote. The school is currently under construction and is scheduled to be finished by the end of April. She needed the funds for the latrines and hand washing station for the school. Lenny’s “Pilas” Project: Peace Corps Volunteer Lenny Van Boven, serving in Chicocox, Quiche Guatemala is leading a project, involving extensive community participation, to provide sinks for use by 86 people. Ventilated Latrines for the Village Of Chuisac: Katie McKenna, a Peace Corp volunteer, contacted Water Charity with a wonderful project in which she would work together with the villagers themselves and a local NGO with which she had previously partnered. In short, Water Charity decided to fund the building of latrines for the entire village of Chuisac in Chimaltenango. The project will be done in stages, with the first 20% already in motion. Sonte School Project: The community of Sonte is located next to the major road running north through Alta Verapaz. It is easily accessible, and close to a major city. It is very poor and consists mostly of peasant farmers. A hand washing station will be built at the elementary school of the community. This project will be carried out by the teachers of the school and Peace Corps volunteer Dave Bowker, working together with community and local government. The school has recently received electricity, which will be used to power the pump. Corozal School Project: Corozal is a small rural village in Alta Verapaz that is surrounded by tropical jungle. There is no electricity available, but the community does have a system of pipes that delivers water to about 50% of the houses and the school from a nearby spring. The project is to build a hand washing station for the school. It will consist of 8 faucets, sufficient to support the school’s growing population. All pipes inside the cement and running to the faucets will be galvanized steel and the cement itself will be reinforced with rebar, making the project very durable. To learn more about Water Charity, please visit their website.
In response to the murders, women in Guatemala are organizing to protect each other. MADRE’s sister organization, the Women Worker’s Committee in Guatemala, has created neighborhood watch groups in their communities. Sandra Gonzales of the Women Worker’s Committee describes the violence as “getting worse every day.” However, she says “with your help we can continue to defend human rights for all women.” You can help these women by providing whistles and flashlights for the neighborhood watch. According to Sandra, “flashlights and whistles are essential to providing security for women and girls in our community,” where there are no street lights and no reliable police protection. If you don’t have the supplies to donate, but still want to make a contribution, you can make a monetary donation to help alleviate the costs of shipping the whistles and flashlights to Guatemala. To find out more about MADRE, please click here.
Eventually, our blog will be bilingual. Until then, we don’t want to miss out on the many groups that have websites only in Spanish. We are looking for a bilingual individual who can post profiles of Spanish speaking charities in English on our blog. If you are interested, please add a comment to this post, or click on the “Contact Us” button, above. Feel free to pass this link along!!
Help Safe Passage celebrate 10 years of success moving children and families beyond the Guatemala City garbage dump. Safe Passage is in search of 15 – 20 communities around the world that are willing to host a 5K walk/run as their community’s annual fundraiser for Safe Passage. ***Will you host an event?*** Their goal: to have thousands of people running and walking together, in friendship and hope and solidarity, to honor Hanley’s vision of helping families build better lives for themselves beyond the garbage dump. The children in Guatemala will be running a 5K as well. Please contact them if you’re interested in helping to host this first-time international event. They will assist you along the way with a checklist of steps to get you successfully to race day on Sunday, September 12, 2010. It’s easy. It’s fun. It’s healthy. It’s a chance to build your own community while connecting with theirs. Contact outreach@safepassage.org or (207) 846-1188 to sign up or to request more information.
The difficulty of working in a developing country, especially in the most rural parts, requires volunteers with special characteristics. Spanish proficiency, or a plan that involves intensive study before the volunteer experience, is critical. Experience travelling in the developing world, or at least a willingness to brave foreign cultural norms and a few weeks of adjusting to the food are also essential. Experience in agriculture, sustainable development, or community projects are also very helpful. But, the traits that we seek most in our volunteers are a passion for social and environmental issues, self-motivation, open communication, and a sensitivity to the needs of others. To learn more about Semilla Nueva’s volunteer opportunities, please send an email to contact@semillanueva.org, and ask for their detailed volunteer packet.
To read more about this group, please visit their Clinic Link Profile, website, or current newsletter. The people of San Juan La Laguna need your help!
Project C.U.R.E. is seeking experienced family practice doctors, dentists, and nurses are to staff a clinic in San Juan La Laguna from November 27 – December 10, 2010. Prominent diseases and areas of treatment include gastrointestinal, fungal infections, respiratory, hypertension, and gynecology. The cost for this trip is $2,000 including airfare, accommodations, in-country transportation and meals. The work at the clinic can be followed by a short leisure trip around Santiago touring various markets, coffee farms, and nature preserves, and a drive to Antigua, a quaint Spanish city that has been preserved in its original form. To participate in this rewarding and wonderful opportunity please contact jeanfeist@projectcure.org.
Over 1,400 women and children were seen in our medical clinic and all patients received donated pharmaceuticals from the COTA pharmacy. In addition to the above services, the orthotic and prosthetic team distributed walkers, wheelchairs and crutches to patients who were screened for these particular needs. The COTA dental team cared for 134 patients during our visit. One hundred volunteer medical and support staff members traveled from 16 different cities in the U.S. to travel with Children of the Americas for the 2010 team. To learn more about this group, please visit their website. Here is a sampling of photos from their trip:
Products could be sold at churches, schools, home sales and other venues. The crafts come already marked and ready to go. They just need to put them out, keep track of what they sell and send the unsold items back to the Sharing the Dream store in South Dakota. This could be a one-time thing or several times a year. Sharing the Dream is working hard to create sustainability for their groups. They are working with artisans on design and marketing, and trying to move them towards making their own designs and finding their own markets. This is a long process but they are making huge strides. For more information, please email the group at info@SharingTheDream.org. Any medical professionals interested in helping out in Haiti, please read this announcement from Partners in Health. If you’re not a medical professional, you can still spread the word! Update: January 13, 2010, 7:30pm As patients flood to our sites from Port-au-Prince, we’re finding ourselves in need of both medical personnel and supplies. In particular, we need surgeons (especially trauma/orthopedic surgeons), ER doctors and nurses, and full surgical teams (including anesthesiologists, scrub and post-op nurses, and nurse anesthetists). If you are a health professional interested in volunteering, please send an email to volunteer@pih.org with information on your credentials, language capabilities (Haitian Creole or French desired), availability, and contact information. I have 50+ pairs of gently used children’s soccer shoes. If any organization has a good use for these, I am happy to donate them, along with some balls, jerseys, etc. I can ship them anywhere within the U.S. To claim them, please click here, or on the “Contact Us” button, above. The following is a description of a six week old baby in Guatemala City, who has been diagnosed with Down’s Syndrome, and will need to have surgery to repair a perforation on his heart. If anyone knows of a mission that could address this need, please either leave a comment below, or click on the “Contact Us” tab, above. “… two Pediatricians confirmed that Javier, who is only 6 weeks old, does have Down’s Syndrome, and he also has a problem with his heart. The cardiologist checked him and did an eco-cardiogram which confirmed that he has two perforations on two different valves of his heart, one of them is smaller than the other, but both need to be watched, because even when the smaller one may close while he grows up, he may need surgery to repair the bigger one in approximately 6 months. Besides asking you to please pray for him, I would appreciate it very much if you could give us some ideas about how to treat his heart issues. Please, let me know if there is a medical mission with Cardiologists coming to perform heart surgeries or something like this, so the baby can be evaluated by them and we may get some more information or help for him.” As part of our site’s design process, we are seeking a volunteer to act as a liaison between the Clinic Link organization, and the Guatemalan Ministry of Health. If you know anyone who is interested, you can email them the link below, or click here to view the description yourself. Link: http://www.idealist.org/if/i/en/av/VolunteerOpportunity/183954-21/c We have made significant progress on our Version 1 design. So, now Clinic Link is recruiting some volunteers to round out our technical team. If you know any techies (regardless of location) who may be interested, please send them to this link. There are four volunteer opportunities posted towards the bottom. If you would rather cut and paste the link into an email, here is the URL: http://www.idealist.org/if/i/en/av/Org/205681-267. If you have any questions, please either leave a comment below, or click here to send me an email. Hearts in Motion is currently seeking volunteers to staff its 2010 trips: In addition to volunteering on trips, there are many tasks that can be done in their office, a person’s local area, or on a computer. If you are interested, please click here to get more information. |
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Semilla Nueva
Children of the Americas
