Dear family and friends,
Happy New Year! We were been blessed to have our whole family together for the holidays. Valerie arrived from RVA the day before Thanksgiving and Katie got here a few days before Christmas. When Valerie returned to school on January 3, the plane that picked her up brought a friend of Katie’s, a Harvard pre-med student who goes by her initials, AC. She is spending a couple weeks with us observing the work at the Kipaka hospital.
Lately we’ve been reminded of the vital role the hospital plays in the lives of the people here. I’d like to share with you two recent surgical cases.
Saturday morning at 6:30 someone from the hospital called Katie and AC to observe a C-section. This was the mom’s 6th pregnancy. The previous five children had been delivered at home, and all had died before or during birth.
This time, the mother had gone into labor at home and was brought to the hospital when things weren’t progressing well. The baby came out limp and not breathing. The nurse began giving mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, slapping the soles of the baby’s feet, and much to AC’s surprise, swinging the baby back and forth by his ankles. After over five minutes had passed, the baby let out a cry and began breathing! Both mom and baby are doing well.
The second case involves one of Matt’s friends, a boy named Cosmas who attended our children’s Bible club. Cosmas had a distended abdomen for years. He was diagnosed with an enlarged spleen, and the doctors said that he would have to wait until he was about 15 years old to have his spleen removed. Recently his health began deteriorating, so an ultrasound was ordered. Surprisingly, his spleen was not enlarged, but he had a very large cyst on the left side of his abdomen. Surgery was scheduled and a cyst the size of a soccer ball containing about one gallon of fluid was removed! His health has dramatically improved, and after losing eight pounds in a single day, he looks like different kid.
We are thankful for the ministry the hospital has in saving lives and in improving the health of others. We want to thank all of you who are a part of this ministry with us.
Love in Christ,
Fred, Karen, Katie, Valerie, and Matthew