A Tzutujil-speaking woman of Mayan descent came to Dr. Carlson with swelling on her left leg. One toe was wrapped in a grimy bandage. To check for any sites of parasitic infestation on the foot, and to honor the aged woman, he took a few minutes to wash her dusty feet in a basin of water.

Her surprise at the unexpected gesture needed no English interpretation, it showed on her face.  “She later told us that the washing of her feet was significant to her,” says Dr. Carlson, “as no one even in her family has ever helped her with that.”

Dr. Carlson applied a wrap to the leg to help maintain circulation and ease swelling, then directed her to the makeshift pharmacy for the meds she needed.

She walked home that day with a lighter step.


Hidden Scars

Many clinic visitors, however, seemed to carry scars—not physical but psychological ones due to past traumas. “We saw many people suffering from anxiety,” says Dr. Sandy Wiederhold, who organized the team’s medical services and treated patients.

In 2005, Hurricane Stan turned Panabaj into an evacuated ghost town after landslides destroyed homes and claimed 600 lives. Before that: the Guatemalan civil war, which lasted three decades.

“One woman said she traces her sleep disorder back to the war, when she saw people hacked to death with machetes,” says Dr. Wiederhold. “It’s difficult to say how many of the headaches and upset stomachs were mainly organically rooted, and how many were trauma-related. But these people have endured multiple traumatic events.”

For some, the anxiety had to do with life at home. “One boy fell and split his lip while playing on the clinic grounds,” recalls Dr. Wiederhold. “His mother’s first concern was not that her son would have a scar; she was afraid her husband would beat her when she got home.”

Several children were so ill that, had they been in the U.S., they would have been admitted to the hospital. But in Panabaj, where many eke out a living as day laborers, the cost of hospitalization is prohibitive.


Gracias!

“The families were so thankful for the treatments,” says team leader Robin Tompkins. “One couple came back to say their nine-month-old, who’d been treated for pneumonia the day before, had slept through the night for the first time in months. Many others came back to thank the doctors and our group.”

While medical staff attended to patients, other team members connected with the children coming through the clinic.

Morning radio host John Balyo of WCSG took individual photos of hundreds of kids and numerous families, the printer churning out smiling faces all day long. For some families, the printed photo was their first-ever family picture.

Four brothers John met on last year’s trip were there again this year, and the team gave two of the boys, Abrahim and David, new shoes. Their old athletic shoes “looked like they’d been through a shredder.”

“I was moved at how our team members humbled themselves to serve the people of Panabaj and the surrounding community,” notes Robin. “They repeatedly put others before themselves.”