Merry Chistmas!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from Bangladesh!!!

Dear friends and family,

                Greetings!  I hope you all are doing well as we come close to the end of 2011. I hope this past year has been filled with many blessings for you and your family!  I have definitely seen God’s blessings this past year, even in the midst of many challenges here in Bangladesh.  

                One of the challenges of living in Bangladesh is the enormous amount of rain!  I had no idea it could rain so much in one place.  This past Monsoon season brought a record amount of flooding to Bangladesh, as seen in this picture.  The heavy rains and swollen rivers prevented me from going on the traditional birth attendants training trip.  But hopefully I will be able to go on another one this winter, the dry season.  Please pray that these plans will all work out.

                Not only have we been flooded with water, but the hospital has also been flooded with babies!!!  During each of the last 4 months, we have had record number of births at the hospital.  We have been able to provide prenatal care and safe deliveries for women, such as Mrs A, who delivered triplets.   Not only were we able to help her with the delivery (by c-section), but while she was in the hospital waiting for the babies to start gaining weight, we were able to share the good news!  Please pray that she will remember the things that she heard and accept it.  Please pray for continued follow up in her community, where there are few believers.

                I’m so grateful that during the challenges of this past year, God has provided a wonderful group of coworkers!  Such as the women in this picture, they are the female medics at the hospital and clinic.  I also work with some pretty amazing midwives and nurses.  Please pray that they would be strengthened during this particularly busy time.  Also pray for those who have not yet accepted the good news!

                One of my favorite praise choruses is ‘Shout to the North’.  The second verse has been particularly encouraging for me this last year.  It says:

                  Rise up women of the truth,                       

Stand and sing to broken hearts,

Who can know the healing power

Of our glorious King of love.

                There are so many women with broken hearts here in Bangladesh, who have yet to know our King, the one who offers that true healing power.   I am so excited that I get to be a part of sharing this wonderful news.

                Thank you so much for all your prayers, encouragement, and support over the last year.   Thanks for being involved in what God is doing here in Bangladesh.  I definitely need your continued prayers as I work in the hospital and the community.  I could also use additional financial support.  If you would like to support the work here, you can do it online at https://www.samaritanspurse.org/index.php/giving/wmm_doctors/

Or you can mail it to:                      

 Samaritan’s Purse

Attn: Post-Residency Program

P.O. Box 3000, Boone, NC 28607

    (828) 262-1980

On your check include Dr Christel Brabon Acct #003765

                        Thanks again for all your continued prayers.  I hope you have a wonderful Christmas and holiday season!

Shubo Borodin (Merry Christmas in Bangla!)

Christel Brabon

Donate Medical Supplies

Hi, friends and family!
If you have access to any medical supplies, we could really use them in Bangladesh.  Right now we are especially in of suture for c-sections (I've been busy with lots of babies coming into the world)!  I could also really use more pessaries (lots of babies brought in to the world 30years ago!).  We are also trying to do laparoscopic surgery, so if you have any equipment, please let me know.  This is such a huge help!  Just email me or comment on the post and I'll give you directions of what to do with it.
Thanks!

Language Blunders!

Learning a new language can be quite frustrating.  However, at times it can also be hilarious!  For example, a couple weeks ago, I was counseling one of my prenatal patients about nutrition in pregnancy.  I decided to list some of the foods I had been learning to say in Bangla.  When I got to spinach, the medic and patient looked at me with confused looks on their faces.  Finally the medic said, "Do you really want her to eat more snakes?"

Not only is there confusion between Bangla and English, but also between American English and the British English that the Bengalis are taught in school.  This past week, I was working on handouts as a follow up to a lecture I had given on shoulder dystocias.  I had said to make sure you always have a stool in the room.  However, Bengali's learn that stool means poop.  So, apparently everyone thought I wanted poop in the room in case we had a shoulder dystocia!  That explains a lot of strange looks!

I'm sure I've made many other blunders, but those are the funniest.  And I'm sure there will be many more to come, but it does add a little humor to the day.  My language study is coming along slowly, but steady.  I have a test on June 13th, so I'd appreciate your prayers.  Also please continue to pray for the village midwife training course on June 10th up in the hill tracts.

Nomoshkar!

Here's a picture of me using a step (not stool) to deliver a baby during a c-section:

Here's another picture of Ajoy and the snake.  He's much more terrified than his face shows!

Six months & Prayer Requests

Hi, Friends and Family!
I can't believe it, but I have now been in Bangladesh for over 6 months!  I have learned so much about the Bangladeshi culture and am starting to pick up more of the language.  I've had to learn so much about practicing medicine in a limited resource area.  It's difficult as an OB/Gyn to see babies that would survive in a NICU in the US, die because we just don't have the necessary supplies and personnel.  Also, I've learned a lot about myself.  I've been reading Helen Roseveare's book "Living Sacrifice".  In the forward she says, "In comparison with the immeasurable sacrifices made by the Lord, anything that I may be asked to give up or do without seems infinitesimally small and not worthy of the name "sacrifice" at all!"  Instead we can come to see God's call as a privilege, even though others may call it a sacrifice.  If you haven't read it, I definitely recommend it.

At the hospital, we've been really busy.  Yesterday, I got to tell a young woman, "wait here's another baby," as she proceeded to deliver surprise twins!  Also, I just finished teaching my first set of midwife continuing education classes.  We focused on shoulder dystocias (when the shoulders get stuck during delivery).  It was so fun to see them learning and running drills with mannequins.  Hopefully this will be the first of many more training sessions that we can do to further their midwifery skills.
In June I'm hoping to go with one of the nurses to teach some training sessions with traditional birth attendants up in the hills.  The traditional birth attendants are the lay midwives that live in the villages and help with home births.  Only a small percentage of women in Bangladesh deliver in hospitals, so it is so important that there be trained birth attendants in the villages to help them out.  Please pray that we would be able to do this training next month and that the rains would hold off so we can get to them.

Life at home is going pretty well! I love my little apartment and it's starting to feel more like home.  I have a house helper named Ajoy, who helps me out around the house while I'm at the hospital all day.  He has been such a huge blessing since basic housework takes ten times as much time here.  Unfortunately, he is terrified of snakes (I'm not a huge fan either!).  Last week, one of the guards killed a 4 foot snake out behind my apartment.  Now Ajoy (who is not a Christian) is absolutely terrified.  Please pray that I would be able to share with him that only God can give us peace and help us not to be afraid.
Here's a picture of the snake:

Thank you all so much for your prayers and encouragement over the last 6 months and please continue!

Once again here are some prayer requests:
     1. Tradition birth attendant class in the hills- June 10th.
     2. Ajoy- to find the only One who can calm his fears.
     3. My continued Bangla language study 

Random Pictures of Life and Work in Bangladesh

Hi!  Here are some more pictures of different aspects of life and my work here in Bangladesh.  Enjoy!

This is the river behind the compound.

These are some of the kids that follow us around whenever we go walking by the river. Aren't they precious!

This goat's just chillin' out outside the hospital.  Not exactly what you see outside of a hospital in the US.

Joy (one of the short termers here for a couple of months) came to watch a c-section and help out with the baby.

Mary (one of the expat nurses) with some patients in clinic. The lady on her left has a horrible vesicovaginal fistula that we have to send to Dhaka to see if they can repair it because it is too complicated for me to do.

Side note- aren't the variations in dress interesting.  The ladies in black are married and wearing burkas, whereas the other two aren't married yet.

WARNING- The rest of these pictures are medical and somewhat gross.

This is me operating on Mrs M.  She had a 30cm ovarian mass that we removed.  She is a tiny woman and this mass made her look term pregnant.  Fortunately we were able to remove it and there was not any other evidence of cancer in her abdomen or pelvis.  Please pray that it is benign and that she recovers quickly.

 

Thanks for all your prayers and encouragement!

Nomoshkar from Bangladesh!

Some Sad Days

Nomoshkar!  February has flown by, and now March is half over, so I thought it was about time I updated by blog.  Life in Malumghat has been pretty interesting.  Most of the time, being an OB/Gyn is fun.  I mean, how fun is it to help a family welcome a new little person into the world!
Unfortunately, not everyday is so fun.  I've had a couple of those days lately.
A couple of weeks ago, I saw an employee from Heart House (the organization that helps support widows by making handicrafts).  Mrs. S had a huge fibroid that was pushing on her bladder so much that she had to wear a catheter all the time.  So in order to improve her quality of life, a visiting OB/Gyn and I took her to the OR for a hysterectomy.  The surgery itself went really well and we were going to try taking out the catheter the next day.  Unfortunately, she developed ARDS, a very serious problem with her lungs as a result of anesthesia. She hung on for several days with a breathing tube and then a trach, but eventually passed away.  Mrs. S had heard the gospel for years while she was working at Heart House, but had never accepted it.  One day, while she was struggling to hang on, she told one of the nurses that she had finally made her decision of faith!  The next day she went to heaven.  How bittersweet!
Here's a picture of Mrs S at the Heart House picnic just a couple weeks before:

Please pray for her family during this time of loss. And that they would come to know Him as well.

Thankfully, not everyday is sad.  Here are a couple of pictures of some of the happier days:

This is Mrs T several days after her surgery.  She had horrible uterine prolapse, but I was able to do a colpocleisis and now she's much more comfortable.

Here's one of my infertility patients who came in for a check.  Please pray that she will be able to get pregnant.  From a medical standpoint, I doubt it will happen with the limited resources we have here, but you never know with God's help it could happen.

Thanks for all your continued prayers and support for me, I really appreciate it.  I am still in need of financial support on a monthly basis.  If you would like to be a part of this ministry to the women of Bangladesh, please click on the left side of the blog, where it says donate, and then follow the instructions to the Samaritan's Purse website.  Thanks again for all your help!

Miracle Baby Update

Hi!  Just wanted to give you all a quick update on the little baby from the emergency c-section after her mom died.  Well, her aunt and dad brought her back to clinic last week for a weight check and she is doing great!
Here she is with her Aunt:

Please continue to pray for her and her family!
Thanks!

Miracle Baby

Hi, friends and family!
Hope you are all having a wonderful New Year!  This new year has already been filled with many blessings, as well as challenges.  I emailed many of you to pray for a special little baby, so I just wanted to give you an update.
Last Tuesday, a mother came to clinic with ecclampsia.  She was at the end of her pregnancy, but had not had any prenatal care.  She began seizing at 7am, but she wasn't brought into our clinic until 11am.  Despite medications and CPR, she passed away.  Fortunately, I was able to do an emergency c-section after she died.  I did not think there was any hope for that baby given all the circumstances, but I went ahead with the stat c-section anyway just in case the baby was still alive.  When I delivered this full term little girl, she was blue and floppy.  I thought for sure she was dead, but amazingly she still had a heartbeat.  The rest of the team worked on her resuscitation.  And now I'm happy to say that she is off oxygen, taking formula feeds, and hopefully will be going home soon.  She truly is a miracle baby!
Thank you all so much for praying for her.  Please continue to pray that she will not have permanent brain damage.  Please also continue to pray for her family as they have lost a wife and mother.  And that they would respond to our Father's love that they have now heard about as a result of this hospitalization.

Isn't she precious!  Thanks again for all of your support and prayers!

Love from Bangladesh,
Christel