Quick Update/Prayer Request

Yesterday, some people may have seen the question Stephen posted on facebook/twitter yesterday, "Which would you rather have- water or electricity?"

While we've never had a choice, we have had many opportunities to talk about this lately.

The hospital continues to have ongoing electrical problems, which affects the water pump as well.

This is a summary of what Joe (Dr. Harvey) said in our meeting last night with the names removed.

The white generator will start, but the motor is shot and needs to be overhauled. The big yellow generator is starting to have problems again. The cable between the Sunday school building and Casa Blanca is fried. The underground cable between surgery and maternity that provides electricity to half of the hospital is not working either. (This effects maternity, administration, blue house, x-ray, lab, chapel, etc.) The best we can hope for now is a temporary fix.

We are in dire need of a full time electrician. Our electricity is becoming more and more of an urgent matter to the point of emergency. A volunteer has designed the system, but doesn't have time to order and assemble the system. Someone else is willing to install the system once assembled. For the time being we are back to a precarious electrical system.

Now the power has been restored to the water tower. We should only use electricity when absolutely necessary and remember that someone's life could depend on the electricity you are using. We should also try to conserve water so that we will not have to run the generator too often. There is a fuel crisis in town. (diesel fuel which is needed to run the generator.) We have payed for the fuel, but cannot get it.

Last night after the meeting, Joe continued working on the electricity and was able to get power back to some parts, including our house. But at best, it is a temporary fix. Please continue to keep this situation in your prayers.

Okei Wapi

As we continue to learn lingala this helpful phrase pops up from time to time. It means Where are you going or where did you go? I am sure many of you are asking that same question. Wegners, okei wapi? Even across the miles I am hearing that question being asked of us.

Well it’s been over a year since we “went” to the Congo and even since we “went” to Impfondo. God has blessed us with a good adjustment in this first year and it’s been neat to see how he has strengthened not only our relationship with Him but with each other as well. But we have each “gone” in other ways as well.

Anna went back to school with the kids in October (the Congolese school year is October through June) and things are going pretty well. The courses are a little harder for both Ian and Isabelle but they are hanging in there. Caleb told me that his first day of school was “amazing” and he still enjoys doing it a lot. Anna has also gone a lot with various short term visitors to make sure they are feeling welcomed and have what they need to adjust to life here in Impfondo.

Isabelle goes to play with some girls of our nursing supervisor here and is using her French and picking up lingala pretty well.

Ian went up in a tree almost a month ago and then had a nasty fall that resulted in a mild concussion and a broken arm (we think since we don’t have xray in town right now) and now a cast for the arm.

I’ve been going to the hospital a lot and continued to get pulled and stretched both in my medical knowledge and in my faith. We continue to do the best we have with what we have. We continually need more nurses to carry the load for us and that is about to get worse when a couple of people who have been helping us out this year return to the states in December. We are also struggling to get official government approval to open our nursing school. There is a lot of duplication in the bureaucracy and so we get conflicting reports as to our prognosis and timing of the opening.

Also our family just went to Brazzaville for a bit of a vacation and to pick up Anna’s brother, John, from the airport. He is coming to spend a month with us.

But the prhase “okei wapi” makes me think of something more poignant as well.

Recently we had a child who came in pretty sick. He had malaria in his brain, was having seizures and was unresponsive. Despite all our efforts the child died. As the wailing began I picked out a question that the mom was screaming. Okei wapi, my child, okei wapi? Where did you go my child where did you go?

Even in the midst of my own pain and frustration I caught that phrase and the more it resonated in my mind the more I thought that the question is a pretty good one. Where am I going now? Am I going further from God or closer to God? Since the child was in a coma when he came in and I am not sure if he has heard what God has done for him I am not sure where he went either. I know at least where I am going when I die. How about you? How about your neighbors?

We hope all of you are going in the right direction as we enter Christmas season. We invite you to continue to pray for us.

Praise God for his protection in our lives

Praise God for the gift of His Son.

Pray for nurses for the hospital. We need more, and for the strength for the ones we have

Pray for a Congolese friend for Ian

Pray for traveling safety.

Thanks again for all everyone is doing to aid God’s work here in Impfondo.

Happy Parting

I wanted to you to meet a patient who is leaving the hospital today. His name is Hènoc (french for Enoch).
He is now almost 6 weeks old. He came in about 6 weeks ago weighing 2lb 12oz. He was with his twin brother who, unfortunately, was dead. He has overcome some major hurdles.
One is that he was a twin that was born at 33 weeks gestational age. Another is that on his second day here he forgot to breath (premature infants sometime do this) and needed chest compressions to get his heart and lungs going again. Then when he was about two weeks old, he caught the flu and almost stopped breathing again. He needed oxygen for about 1 week with that episode. Since then he has done remarkable well and today weighs 4lb 6oz.

His mom has been incredible during this time as well. She hand expressed breast milk to feed him by a tube that went from his nose to his stomach, she maintained hope when it seemed to be lost, and she has been a good teacher to other parents with premature infants as well.
The only thing she has not done well is pick me to name the child. I picked the name Enoch for two reasons. One is that I hope like Enoch the child will walk with God. The other is that like Enoch I hope that this child will not die and will leave to see the return of Christ.

Also during Hènoc's time here there have been several other infants who have received the same care but not lived. Why? I am not sure. I know that we live in a fallen world where we see through a glass darkly. One day things will be set right. In the meantime, I rejoice in these victories and pray that my hope for Hènoc will come to fruition.

I also want to thank you for praying for us during this time. Those prayers have been answered in the life of Hènoc.

A tour of words

I wanted to give everyone an update of what is going on here. You have seen pictures and heard stories of what is going on here, but today I wanted to take you on a little tour of our hospital with words. I would like to tell the story of every patient, but that would be too long. Instead, I will give you a few examples. This post WILL CONTAIN MEDICAL INFORMATION. If that is not your thing, you can skip to the bottom where it says SUMMARY. The most important thing to realize is that there are a lot of people who need help, and we are trying to provide it.

There are seven buildings that we are using for inpatient care areas right now, and then there are some available for overflow as well.

We will start as the doctor usually does in the Salle de Soin (literally room of care). This is a nursing station, post op care room, intensive care unit, and emergency room rolled into one. Currently there are three patients in this room.

One is a 33 yo refugee who paid to have an abortion, and the nurse doing it ruptured her uterus, pulled out her intestines, and then told her there was nothing more to do. After she arrived here, Dr. Fuka was forced to do a hysterectomy, cut out all of her rectum and create a colostomy. The colostomy is a piece of intestine hooked to the skin and functions to let stool out. This will be permanent for her. The other is a 6 yo boy with severe anemia (hematocrit of 7 w normal being 35-45) and hepatitis C as well. The 3rd is a 15 yo who chose (or was forced) to fight with the rebel forces and now has several wounds. The worst is in his right arm where the bullet injured his nerves in his arm. Now he has electric pain shooting down his arm.

Moving on to the maternity ward, we have 2 preemies in here, a handful of normal deliveries, and one very large full term infant born to a refugee mom. The mom started her labor 2 days before she came to us. On the second day of her labor, she went to a health clinic about a 1/2 day away. They saw she was 8cm dilated, and they decided to rupture her membranes. The baby's hand came out, but he was stuck. He was not head down like he should have been but was lying cross ways. She came to us the following day. We looked for signs of life in the baby with a doppler and ultrasound, but saw none. We did a c-section to get the baby out and to save the mom's life. Just before we did that, we placed the baby's hand back in the uterus. However, once the baby came out, he started to cry! He is now off oxygen and is trying to nurse.

The next room is the woman's medicine ward. Here we have a woman who received HIV and probably her Tb from her now deceased husband. She has been here for 6 weeks. She is all alone with no one to care for her. We are trying to show the love of God to her while she is here.

The next room is the pediatric ward, and I could write a post just about that. I will say that it is full-- 10 kids in 8 beds. (We have two sets of twins here.) There are 3 with the flu, 3 with malaria, 2 with dehydration, and one with malnutrition. All three of the kids with flu were born premature and then caught the flu. One is critically ill.

In the men's medicine ward we have a man who has conjunctivitis and something called iritis in both eyes. He is now functionally blind. He is slowly responding to treatment but really needs an ophthalmologist or optometrist. There is also the man who is newly diagnosed with HIV, and he is struggling to have the courage to tell his wife and get his kids tested.

Moving to the surgical men's ward there are 8 men, 7 of which have conflict related wounds. This ranges from a police officer with cut tendons in both hands, to two men with broken femurs; from gunshot wounds, to an amputation of an arm for the same.

IN the surgical woman's ward there are 5 women. One who had a ruptured ectopic pregnancy, three war wounded and one elderly lady who had her gall bladder out. One of the war wounded is an 11 yo girl who needed her right leg amputated at the knee for infection after a gunshot wound. She has displayed remarkable spirit and his slowly getting better.


SUMMARY:
We currently have about 37 patients around 15 of which are here because of the conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo. I would ask you to pray for the 3 infants with the flu, Heretier (who is a 15 yo with pain from a gunshot wound nerve injury),the 33 yo woman who lost her uterus secondary to a botched abortion), and a man newly diagnosed with HIV. Pray that he would have the courage to tell his wife and that there would be reconciliation there.

Pray also for our team at this time. Some of our patients are very hard to love, and there is so much loss and sadness sometimes it hurts to much to care. Pray that we would be able to live with the Joy of Christ even as we weep His tears of pain for the pain and suffering that we see around us. Thanks for partnering with us and showing interest in what God is doing through us.

Merry "Roc"in Christmas

Tis the season to be...???? Jolly? Content? Hot? Evacuated? Yes all the above are possibilities for the Wegner family in the ROC this Christmas season. I wrote last update that the situation had calmed down a bit, but since then there have been some "rebel" attacks on some of the boats coming up the river and this past Thursday there were some R.O.C. troops involved in some shooting as well. There are lots of refugees along the river and it is good to be able to help them, but there are always more. For a sampling last week, we evaluated a woman after a rape and her husband for a spear wound to the thigh, there was another child who came in with 9 days of malaria and a hematocrit (blood count) in the teens. (normal is in the high 30's and 40s) then there was the child with malnutrition and the woman who need an operation for an abscess and.....I could go on. Suffice it to say that we have a lot of work here and there are is now fighting to the north and to the south of us as well but all (so far on the Democratic Republic of Congo side of the river. Our team has mad some evacuation plans to be prepared, and we have some bags packed (just in case) although i must say we feel pretty safe so far.
So continue to pray for our situation here, it is very fluid and can change very fast.
We also have a small epidemic of premature births here. They keep getting smaller and younger but by God's grace they are doing ok.

I also wanted to post some happy holiday Christmas pictures for you from our Christmas service this Sunday.


Here are the "Mary and Joseph of the Christmas play.









Here is one of the refugees singing praises. He has made a remarkable spiritual and physical recovery. One of his songs today he sang was "Jesus M'aime" Go Club Jeunesse of Sherbrooke.






Here is the required children's choir. We actually had a lot of singing today, and the only songs that were not full of joy and excitement were those with European origins (like silent night).





It is sometimes a little to much singing as you can see with Caleb here.











But we are all happy to be celebrating the birth our Savior who was born into a volatile situation of his own. From our family to yours Merry Christmas!

back on line

Thanks to all you prayer warriors.
You have made our first week in Congo a resounding success!
Keep up the good work
We are in Impfondo, our luggage is as well.
We are connected to the internet and will be getting settled in gradually.
There will be picts to follow, I hope, and more details. as well.

Thanks again