On our fourth day of CCC clinic work, we drove an hour and a half through lush green forests and mountains north of Coban to the town of Chisec. This is the rural location where we established the Collie and Greg Daily Clinic in the town’s health center. This new clinic, generously donated by the Daily Family, serves many very poor towns and villages in the province of Alta Verap
The area’s residents have small plots of land where they grow corn to feed their families all year. The road we took continues north to the border with Mexico. The road traffic, filled with truck drivers, accounts in part for the high positive rate of HPV infection in Chisec.
The Chisec health center was simple but had room for three CCC examination stations. Large numbers of local women, often holding their children, were waiting to be examined when we arrived. We set up our examination stations and within a half hour were registering, seeing and treating patients.
Our staff consisted of two local nurses, Anna and Elsa who had been trained by CCC in Coban. We also worked with Doctor Mayra from Coban, nurse Suli, and our own CCC team of Dr. Patricia Gordon, our family practitioner, 3 medical students and 2 volunteers who registered patients and kept data on their medical outcomes.
Many patients spoke only Q’eqchi, the local indigenous language. We developed a smooth operation, thanks to our Q’eqchi-speaking nurses.
Every time we thought we had exhausted our supply of patients, more women showed up to be examined. We saw vividly how much rural people value medical attention and how badly the women needed to learn about the potential danger of pre-cancerous lesions.
We are grateful to have had the opportunity to bring See and Treat to rural Guatemala. Our deep thanks to Collie and Greg Daily.