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Overseas Volunteer Work

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Our Most Recent Volunteer Trip - Delicias, Mexico

In September of 2009 Dr. Frank led a team of ten to provide free primary eye care to the poor of the city of Delicias. The team was made up of three doctors and seven volunteers. In two days they saw just shy of 800 patients and handed out over 750 pairs of eyeglasses. Numerous eye conditions were diagnosed. Those that could be treated were, and those that required surgery or prolonged treatment were referred to a local service club. These patients then became special projects for the club so that they would get the care they needed now and in the future.

Delicias is a city of about 100,000 located in the Mexican state of Chihuahua and is about 60 miles south east of the capital city of Chihuahua. It is a working man’s town with an economy based on agriculture and manufacturing. Like many of the places where the volunteer teams go, this isn’t on most people’s must see list. Having said that, we found it to be full of fun, hardworking, and caring people. As I have said many times in the past, these trips are a win, win, win proposition. We got to help a lot of very needy and appreciative people, we improved their feelings about the United States and its people, and we got to see and know the people of another part of the world like no tourist ever does. Hope you enjoy the pictures!

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The first thing you notice when working in these clinics is the lines. Seven or eight hundred people waiting to see you, is not uncommon.

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I am always amazed at how patient and understanding these people are, no matter where I am in the world.

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A name, an age ,and a chief complaint has to be taken for each and every one.

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Then it is the doctor's turn. What I am doing here is called retinoscopy. By shinning a beam of light into the eye, we can determine what a persons prescription is. We also are checking the health of the front part of the eye.

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The next thing we do is look inside the eye. We are looking for health issues such as diabetes and high blood pressure.

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For a healthy person who just needs glasses, we spend about 90 seconds. For the many unhealthy patients, whatever it takes.

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Then the fun part, getting the patient their new glasses. Each of those boxes on the tables in the background hold 40 to 50 pair of glasses.

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If you do the math, it means we bring three to four thousand glasses to each of these clinics so that we can have enough of what we need.

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The volunteers have to go to the right box, match the patients prescription in an appropriate style frame, try the glasses on the patient, and if the glasses do what they are supposed to do, then fit the frame to the patients face.

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This is the best part because this is where you get the big grins, the hugs, and the kisses.

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An awful lot to learn, in two long days for our volunteers

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People are always asking me, why do I do this year after year? Is it the wonderful people I get to meet? Or is it the many different cultures I get to learn about?

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Is it the joy of helping people to see, sometimes for the first time in their lives?

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Or is it the food? I know several of my friends think this is the real reason.

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Or is it the case like this one, of which, I seem to get at least one on every trip. This mother came to us to see if we could do surgery on her son who had always had crossed eyes. A quick exam, a new set of glasses, and the crossed eyes were gone. A miracle from the mom's perspective, but just good medicine from ours.

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Or is it the wonderful people, who become like family, as you work together to make the world a better place?

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I'm not sure I really know the answer.

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I just know, that it is the right thing to do!