Why am I going?
Over the past several years, I have been a distant partner in the work and ministry of Dr. Brett MacLean who is the chief pediatrician at the Koutiala Women's and Children's Hospital in Mali, West Africa. www.koutialahospital.org
As a practicing pediatric oncologist, I have been fielding questions and offering advice on the treatment of Malian children with certain malignancies and blood disorders. Koutiala hospital is able to get basic chemotherapy drugs and is currently treating children with acute leukemia, wilms tumor, burkitt lymphoma, and other malignancies.
We have also been working on starting a screening program for sickle cell disease. The prevalence of sickle cell disease in Mali is very high and the death rate in the first 5 years of life is as much as 50% for children with the disease. Most of these deaths are the result of a type of bacterial infection that can be prevented by starting penicillin at birth for the children who test positive for sickle cell disease.
I have been praying that a good opportunity would come up for me visit with Brett and his family in Mali and after much planning my visa is finally here and the tickets have been booked!! I leave from Atlanta on 8/12 and after a day's worth of travel (London to Paris to Mali) I will finally be making footprints in Mali.
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