Recently, Barco’s Nightingales Foundation sponsored a medical mission trip for nurses Erin Marlin and Alana Baron to a remote village in the Dominican Republic. Here, Erin recounts their first day.

Today we went to a remote village WAY up in the mountains called Santa Elena. There is super sad poverty there….kids without shoes, wearing dirty clothes, etc. Some kids were even running around without clothes. The “homes” were made out of tin, wood, or concrete…or a combination of the three. To call them a home is definitely a stretch. It’s extremely humbling to see this in person and puts things into a unique perspective. I wish I could help every single person.

We have a GREAT team. It’s amazing how you put a group of people together who don’t know each other at all…and due to the circumstances and what we share in common…we all work great together. There are nine people on our team, 1dentist, 1 ophthalmologist, two general practice doctors and 5 nurses. The eye doctor, Tara, brought 400 pair of eyeglasses. She is doing eye exams on everyone (mainly children) and providing glasses for free if needed. The dentist (Adam) saw 15 patients today and extracted 45 teeth out of those 15 patients. The general doctors (Edward and Greg) saw around 120 patients. The nurses triaged all the patients, created our own “pharmacy” and provided medication as needed. We have a ton of local men that are helping us with translation to Spanish, Creole and French. We will go back to the same village tomorrow and then stay near Barahona, where we are housed and see patients there.  

We are so proud of the work Erin and her team are doing and grateful to be part of their mission.
~Michael and Frida Donner