Mbingo 2023

We were able to make a trip back to Mbingo Baptist Hospital in January of this year. Here are a few updates from our time there.

It was great to be back working alongside those that work and serve at Mbingo year-round. There continues to be challenges from the ongoing conflict in the area, but God is faithful to provide for the hospital. We are thankful that we can be a part of that while we are there and also in many ways throughout the year even when we are in Charlotte.

This is Chuck with Jewel Greywoode on a hike to the back waterfall (in dry season). Jewel is an ENT physician with a focus on facial plastics. He has been part of Samaritan's Purse cleft lip trips in the past and has served in multiple hospitals in Africa. He also goes to our church here in Charlotte. Over the past year, Chuck and Jewel have been talking about him joining us on a trip to Cameroon. Mbingo has a ENT/head and neck fellowship program that includes one year of training after completing a general surgery residency. This is led by Wayne Koch (ENT physician) and has been running successfully for a few years. Jewel has an interest in medical/surgical training at mission hospitals and this seemed like a perfect fit. We chose our dates in January to go and only later found out that Wayne Koch was going to be there at the same time. God clearly provided this timing for Jewel and Wayne to work together and for Jewel to see how the training program is run at Mbingo. Jewel really enjoyed the time at Mbingo working alongside Cameroonian surgeons in training and sharing his knowledge and experience with them.

This is the ABG (arterial blood gas) machine in the ICU at Mbingo. This has been a needed advance for delivery of critical care at the hospital. It is challenging to provide care to intubated patients without an ABG machine, but thankfully those days are behind us. This is another example of the staff at Mbingo overcoming challenges to get the needed equipment to provide the best care they can to the patients.

Mbingo continues to use an electronic medical record (EMR) and it has been successful. It is a hybrid system with the main written notes scanned into the chart, but with labs and imaging added digitally. This is a huge advance over the written and filed cards and books the hospital used in the past. Patients still do have their own personal written books that they carry with them. These patient books include outpatient visit notes and hospital summaries and provides a portable medical record for the patients. The EMR at Mbingo is used mostly for inpatient record tracking, but will continue to expand its uses. This picture shows patient registration on the female ward.

Chuck finally tried some goat meat and onions from a roadside grill on the way to (and from) the hospital on the long drive from Douala. It was great and now will be an expected part of lunch on those long drives.

The trip home from Mbingo to Charlotte was eventful to say the least. We took off from Douala and made the normal landing in Yaounde, Cameroon to pick up and drop off people. However, the plane had a mechanical issue and ultimately the flight was cancelled. The next flight was the following night, so we had a full day in Yaounde. This was after getting to a hotel at 5am after a long list of mishaps. While in Yaounde, we were able to see the Shinars who are friends of ours who live in Cameroon. This is Angela with Lori after she helped us get some lunch and we enjoyed an afternoon catching up. Josh was traveling so we missed him this time, but we did get to see their two daughters and the local school where Lori teaches.

It was another great trip to Mbingo and we are already looking forward to the next time we can be with our Cameroonian friends and family.