Day-10, July 12, 2009

As I reflected upon the mid-adventures and mis-steps of the trek to Concepcion...I wondered about the other side of the story....the perspective of our sponsor...on that ill-fated day so the media team decided to interview Ron and Violet Firestone.

As our mission members were frustrated, so were the Firestones. Dr. Ron has spent most of his life in Bolivia and is a chiropractor by profession. He says that 45 percent of adult men and women suffer pains and strains of heavy work. He has conducted and led perhaps hundreds of mission clinics for years. His approach differs from that of our team. He believes in triage only for the extreme cases - parachuting in to treat the worst cases - and dispensing medication for the short-term - only until the patient can see his or her doctor. He does not believe in lengthy consultation during these clinics - nor in dispensing medication for the longer-term because he fears Bolivians may misunderstand the directions and consume it all at once or share it with their neighbours. He does however believe in preventative medicine such as teaching those who come to a clinic to brush their teeth. The Firestones call their way the "Bolivian way."

Then there is the "Canadian way." In some respects the two ways are similar. For example, our dental team instructs patients on how to brush as well. Then there are differences. Our medical and dental teams interview patients about their ailments, create a record for each patient and dispense medication for the longer-term as they deem appropriate. Dr. Trudy Poggemiller says the differences swirl around a disagreement over minimum versus maximum standards. Judith Mitchell adds that the Canadian team is always concerned about risk management.

The tensions between the "Bolivian way" and the "Canadian way" have been palatable. The media team is interested less in judgement and blame. More about what can we as a mission team learn. So we asked our team over dinner on the final night of our mission work. We discovered there are five lessons: the five C's.

#1 - COMMUNICATION
Team leader Dr. Evelyn Elsey believes the first lesson is about upfront communication. What does the sponsor expect? What do we as a mission team want to accomplish? How will we work in tandem?

#2 - CONTRACTING
The second lesson is a drilling down of the first and it comes from Dr.Trudy Poggemiller and Judith Mitchell: look beyond the personalities and create a contract or manifesto and checklist of questions for each clinic site:

a) What does the site access (travel) look like?
b) What are the logistical arrangements?
i. Toilets
ii. Food and water
iii. Sterilization and other medical facilities
iv. Interpreters
c) What support is required and what support are we offering?
d) Who are the contact people?

#3 - CONTEXT
The third lesson is about context. As Dr.Hardy Limeback asked for example, what are the political pressures under which the sponsor is working? What might be the personal pressures?

#4 - COLLABORATION
The fourth lesson says Dr Evelyn is having an openness to collaborate and she points to a positive working partnership she established with a sponsor on a mission to South Africa. Where is the honest exchange about the best of our approaches? What do we bring to the table? And what does the sponsor bring to the table? For example, Dr. Trudy was interested in learning about the benefit of sulfuric soap as a treatment for fungal infections.

#5 - COORDINATOR TO TROUBLE-SHOOT
The final lesson says Dr. Evelyn is about trouble-shooting. Who will represent our mission team's interests when things go wrong? Who will ensure that the logistics are in place? Who will be the single point of accountability? In this instance, we had no one assigned to that role locally.

As a wise person once told me, in every endeavor in life there is a blessin' and there is a lesson.

Some members of the team such as Dr. Trudy are not at peace with this mission. Others like Judith, are frustrated and are choosing not to follow-up on their concerns. Another team member, Janet Duff is circumspect: "there are incongruities between all societies. I think the important thing is not to reconcile them but to understand each other. Every time I see a new culture I learn new or different ways of doing things. I believe that understanding and respecting each other is the key to living in a global village."

As a final note, the media team has learned that perhaps part of our responsibility is to ask the questions that might lead to self-discovered leanings.

Here is a link that you can click to a see the mission photo gallery. http://gallery.me.com/davidhillock