From the Founder

Hospitals of Hope founder Michael Wawrzewski writes about the many changes happening at HOH. You can read about all the latest news that Michael mentions and more in our fall newsletter (PDF).

After thirteen years of ministry, many things are changing around Hospitals of Hope. Personally, we will be adding another member to the Hospitals of Hope family this November as Elizabeth and I are expecting our first child, a little girl. With all our international traveling and Elizabeth’s dental school, we did not think it wise to add to our family before, but now all seems right….ready or not here she comes.

Here in Wichita, we have also implemented many changes. The warehouse, which has always been packed with medical supplies, is now almost completely empty. Bolivia and many African countries have instituted new laws that prohibit the importation of expired medical supplies, which is what we generally receive in donation. With this in mind, over the past five months we redistributed our supplies and equipment to our partnering organizations. Now the space once used to house donated supplies is a production area for Clinic In A Cans. Over the past year, we have built nine container clinics that have been shipped to Haiti and Africa and we continue to build more. We believe this to be a very economical method to replicate our ministry providing a completely contained, cost effective medical clinic to areas of the world in great need.

Elizabeth and I just returned from Bolivia in September after being absent for seven months. I must admit that I am impressed at the growth and organization of the hospital led by Rudy Guzman, our hospital administrator. Leta Reppert is now in charge of the guesthouse and volunteers serving at the hospital and she is doing a great job integrating the volunteers at the hospital. Another great addition and change was converting one corner of the patient waiting area at the hospital into Xelda’s Café. We have created a very warm and inviting environment. As patients wait to be attended at our hospital, volunteers serve free drip coffee, tea and cookies. Patients feel more comfortable sitting at one of the small coffee tables than a hospital waiting area. These patients more readily reveal personal problems, health concerns and family matters to our staff who take the opportunity to listen and pray with them.

We are very excited about all the changes taking place and the new opportunities to minister around the world!

Thank you as always, for your support.

Michael Joseph Wawrzewski III

Bolivia Update: Growing in Opportunities

Leta updates us from Bolivia about volunteers doing the World Race and about news from the hospital.

The volunteers we have right now are with the World Race, which means that they’re traveling around to 11 different countries in 11 months, volunteering in each country. Since they’re not medical, like most of our volunteers, I’m having them help out at a variety of different organizations. Several of them are helping out at a school for deaf kids, a few of them are painting the school down the road from the hospital, several are helping at orphanages, and a couple are working at an organization that provides support for kids who work (selling things, shining shoes, etc).

With help from them, Shelly, and Rachel (two nurses who are here long-term), I’ve been teaching an English class in the hospital for staff and interns. It’s been a lot of fun. I’ve always loved teaching but hated grading, and, in this class, I get to teach but not grade anything! It’s a lot of fun seeing them being able to start fitting sentences together and starting to understand the way a new language works.

Shelly and Leta in Bolivia

After going back home for a couple of weeks, Shelly is back here, working again as a surgical nurse. She and Rachel are also training to be intensive care nurses. Since we live right behind the hospital, they will be able to go to the hospital with just a couple of minutes notice. Most of the nurses here who are able to do intensive care live 30 minutes to an hour away from the hospital, so having Shelly and Rachel able to just show up and start work will be a huge help.

We have a volunteer coming in a couple of weeks who is studying for her Masters in Public Health. I’m really excited about the work she’ll be doing here – she is going to be working on developing materials so that future volunteers can give more presentations on basic health topics. It’s always sad to me to see how many people are sick with things that could have been easily prevented, or to see kids with their teeth rotting out because they don’t know how important it is to brush their teeth.

Thanks to all of you who are praying us!