ICMDA World Congress

After three full days of meetings, we are now on the final, fourth day of the Congress and preparing to fly home. Over 700 doctors, medical students and nurses from over fifty nations have been gathered together in the resort city of Punta del Este in Uruguay, and it has been a time of great blessings and encouragement. And this followed on from three days of a well received preconference programme for students, PRIME and International Saline tutors and Psychiatrists.

The Bible expositions by Pablo Martinez have been excellent, looking at the life of Joseph, while the plenaries have looked incisively at what it means to serve God through our work.

However, it has as ever been the relationships and meetings outside of the formal programme that have borne the most fruit. The Zimbabwean doctors and students were excited to share how things are changing in their nation after ten, difficult years, and thanked CMF in the UK for our ongoing fellowship and support. Over the breakfast table various groups have been discussing how we can advance training and mentoring for the next generation of Christian leaders in medicine and nursing, and advance the wider training programmes for doctors, nurses being developed by PRIME, ICMDA, HCFI, International Saline, NCFI and others.

This has also been a key meeting for ICMDA as the leadership changes hands. Our own Kevin Vaughan has taken on the chairmanship from Australia's Peter Ravenscroft, while the General Secretary Daryl Hackland is preparing to step down at the end of this year and hand over Vinod Shah of India.

ICMDA also welcomed several national fellowships as new members, including Malawi, Sudan, Ethiopia, Bolivia, Brazil, Nepal, and we also welcomed a lively (and sizeable) New Zealand contingent and our old friend Matt Kehoe.

NCFI and HCFI also had a presence at the conference, co-leading a two day nursing seminar programme in parallel to the main conference for around twenty five nurses from across Latin America and further afield –exploring the concept and practice of total patient care.

We enjoyed some excellent food, and despite a couple of days of torrential mid-winter rain, we have enjoyed some glorious weather, some great food. Latin America came closer to us all, and we were encouraged to think more of the Spanish speaking world in our international vision.

Developing Health Course - Wednesday 8 July - Back home

Back in the office at Johnson House and life is returning to normal after a busy, sunny, exhausting, happy fortnight at Oak Hill. Laura and I are surrounded by about 800 feedback forms from all the different sessions! The participants were very positive about the course – 'I've come away inspired and excited...' 'The standard of teaching was excellent and I felt refreshed in many different ways...' 'Spiritually, it's been so encouraging...''I came away fired up with new ideas...' 'The food has been so good I've gone up three sizes!' were among their comments.

There have been some wonderful people on the course – participants and speakers alike have told stories which have inspired and challenged us and shared wisdom and experience. A total of 61 participants came – some for the full fortnight, others for one week, others as day visitors. In all we had 41 different speakers – it's fantastic that have such a wealth of expertise in CMF – heartfelt thanks to all of them for giving their time and energy.

It is exciting to think about the impact that this course has each year. This year's participants are returning or going for the first time to 18 different countries where they will use their newly acquired knowledge and skills to care for many hundreds of patients, and to teach others who will care for many hundreds more – from Peru to Pakistan and Tibet to Tanzania.

Next year's course is booked for 26 June - 8 July 2011. Maybe we'll see you there?

Vicky Lavy
Head of International Ministries

Developing Health Course - Friday 2 July

Today I want to be an obstetrician. Last week it was an ophthalmologist and then a psychiatrist after the moving talks we heard about the needs and opportunities in those fields. Yesterday we heard Jacqui Hill speak about the plight of woman in Afghanistan which UNICEF describes as 'one of the worst places in the world in which to be pregnant.' The statistics are shocking – in the remote district where Jacqui worked:

• 1 in 16 women die in childbirth
• 74% of children born to those mothers die
• 3% women see a health worker for antenatal care and 1% for delivery
• Only 5% women can read

Poverty is one of the causes of these appalling figures but just as important is the low value put on women. They may be left in labour at home for days because the effort and cost of taking them to a health facility is not considered worthwhile. They are hidden behind the burka and treated worse than the animals in some households. How different to Jesus, who spoke with such love and respect to the bleeding woman in Mark chapter 5 – or Paul, who told husbands to love their wives as Christ loves the church.

We heard Roquia's story – a woman who had been in labour for four days before her family decided to take her to a clinic. It was a three day journey to get there by stretcher, across mountains and through rivers. At the small, remote clinic they weren't used to doing surgery but Jacqui knew that Roquia would die if they didn't try to take out the dead baby and sew up her ruptured uterus. So they boiled up some instruments in the pressure cooker, dragged a table into the biggest room, gave some IV ketamine and performed a successful operation. Roquia lived. Jacqui says

'I never would have thought I could do it – but God enables you when you need it.'

Lastly, we heard about the 2 million women in the world who suffer from vesico-vaginal fistula as a result of prolonged labour with no obstetric care. These women are totally shunned by society – their baby is dead, their husbands divorce them and they are left as outcasts. But an operation can cure them completely and restore their dignity. What better thing than to be an obstetrician and transform these women's lives?

Let's 'give up our small ambitions' - and go change the world!

Vicky Lavy
Head of International Ministries

Developing Health Course - Wednesday 30 June

Day 8 and it's surgery. John Rennie and Colin Binks gave such an encouraging presentation that we all now feel we could do a laparotomy! We learnt some other useful skills too, including suturing (useful or the laparotomy of course) and taking skin grafts, practised on oranges so it's fruit salad for lunch tomorrow. The most gruesome session so far (but great fun!) was learning how to take out a tooth. Tim Cudmore had even brought along some pigs' heads for us to practise on – takes an amazing amount of force to pull out a pig's tooth!

In the evening Ira told us her story – she's an Indian doctor who's been doing medicine in the UK for 15 years – as an SpR and then a consultant. She felt God calling her back to India to serve her own people – she was encouraged by the 'Who is my Neighbour' workshop we ran in London and then set off in January to a Leprosy Mission hospital. She found herself on a 1 in 3 covering the 60 bedded hospital and seeing 200 outpatients every day, and the pressure of work began to take its toll. After about a month she was in her room, composing her letter of resignation when one of the hospital staff visited her and showed her Gideon's story – a man disheartened and overwhelmed by the constant attacks of the Midianites. God's words to him spoke powerfully to Ira;

'Go in the strength you have and save Israel out of Midian's hand. Am I not sending you?' - Judges 6:14

Ira knew that God is sending her and will enable her if she trusts in him. She is planning to return long term.

Vicky Lavy
Head of International Ministries