Stephanie's Mercy Ship Blog!

Already our hospital is almost full and our women’s ward is running at full capacity! Praise the Lord! This means we have had more than 25 women who have already received surgery!! Our women usually arrive the day they get surgery, have surgery, and then recover in our wards as we monitor for leaks and make sure they are recovering well. These women have catheters (tubes that go into the bladder to drain urine) for around 10-14 days while the site heals and then we take out the catheters and make sure they are able to retrain their bladders to pee again. So far 5 of these women have gone through the whole process successfully! This past week I got to be a part of the dress ceremony that we put on for all the women on our ward who have had these successful surgeries. The patients who are stable enough to go attend, as well as the nurses, doctors, day crew, and any other crew members that want to attend. As you can imagine, it can be quite packed! The ladies are then given a new dress

I found out that there are only 83 surgeons in Cameroon and 24 anesthesiologists, and they have a population of 23.4 million people. Per 100,000 people there is 1.15 surgical specialists and anesthetic and obstetric providers. If you do require surgery in Cameroon, you will also need money to pay for it. If you have the money to pay for it, you may not have a surgeon available for your surgery, or they may not have advanced enough equipment or knowledge. Therefore thousands of these people live with painful conditions where they sometimes slowly die from a treatable cause. We get the privilege of treating some of these patients on Mercy Ships. However, we still have to turn many away. There is such a great need and it is heartbreaking when you have to say no, knowing there are no other options left for this individual. Why so much suffering? This question is one that I often ask, and get asked a lot wherever I go. It is a question that can’t be answered. And I believe even if y

Hello friends and family! First off, I just want to say thank you so much for looking at my blog! This is the first time I have ever done one of these, and I want to warn you that I am not a writer, but I will try my best! ;) It has been over 1 week since I have arrived in Douala, Cameroon and it has been very packed! Mercy ships is definitely one incredible ship! The amount of planning and volunteers needed to run something like this is truly mind blowing. The ship has over 400 volunteers from many different countries and cultures, and it's great to see how amazing everyone works together. Everyone has a crucial role to play from being a cook, to working on the deck, to transportation, to engineers, to plumbers, to physiotherapists, to doctors, to anesthesiologists, to nurses, to ophthalmologists, to dentists, to security, to chaplaincy . .. the list is endless !! It is all so complicated, but it works! And they're all volunteers, paying to be here. We also have crew co