NEWSBYVANESSA LOPEZ

I sat down early yesterday morning to brainstorm ideas for a new marketing video I’m helping to create for our Global Medical Brigades program. To get the the creative juices flowing, I started by reviewing promo videos from other non profit organizations I know of. During my search I found many videos that use the “shame” tactic to get you to volunteer. They give you the statistics then make you feel bad that you’ve done nothing. It started to make me think about all the ways in which people, especially Global Brigades students, are motivated to volunteer. Where some truly are passionate about giving, others solely do it to put it on their resume. My first gripe when recruiting students was that I only wanted the students who truly cared, the ones that didn’t need the “shame” tactic to get them to volunteer.

Coming across students who ask about their resume, about how much free time they’ll have, or whether or not they actually have to work always disgusted me. I would think that there’s no way I would want someone like that on my brigade. I even shared my thoughts with the CEO of our organization. His response was, “regardless of why they’re doing it, they’re still helping those in need in some capacity, and plus you never know how it could change them.”

So, reluctantly, I would recruit the resume builders to join. I would observe these students as they showed no real interest in the cause. But I couldn’t really complain, because just like those who were there out of “shame”, they were still there. They still took one week of their winter, spring, or summer break to be in a developing country.

As I watched these students, I noticed something different though, I noticed a gradual change. Slowly, day by day, over one week, they started to care a little bit more. So I started to realize, maybe they’re not here for the “right” reasons but maybe this brigade was all it took for them to realize there is another reason. Brigades truly do empower students, not to just help communities, but to empower students to become aware of the world around them, good and bad.

Now, I think, if I can just change the perspective of one more student, that’s enough for me. If it takes telling students that they’ll have a great resume, or if takes scary statistics on a promo video, then it’s worth it. One person can change the world for the better and you never know who that person may be. If I can increase those odds by just a little, then it makes this work worth it even more. Each day is a reason to keep striving for change and to never lose hope in those around us, even those who don’t see the world the same way we do.

We arrive at the community to a line of already 50 patients waiting to be seen. Some villagers walk to our medical brigades from hours away, knowing that it may be their one chance for medical care over the next four months or so. I walk down the line welcoming everyone as best as I could and my greetings were returned with grateful smiles.

Each station is set up as the villagers wait patiently. The intake station is stocked up with our medical intake sheets and our intake crew begin writing patients’ names on the sheets and handing them out to the patients to take to the next stations. Students proficient in Spanish set up the triage station to take the vitals of their patients to mark on the sheets to prepare for consult. In the consult station the doctors and physician assistants prepare to take patients to diagnose. Last, in the pharmacy station students start spreading out the medicine that they all spent hours the night before sorting and labeling.

After we begin seeing patients, I walk through the whole process. In the intake station, students and staff try to write down the name of each person on individual sheets, sometimes having to write down three or four names per person. I’m surprised to find that some don’t know how old they are. I stop for a moment to think about having absolutely no concept of time, years, yet alone age.

The patients then wait in another line for triage. In the triage station students are taking blood pressures, temperatures, heights, weights, and even glucose levels for the doctors and physician assistants. Patients describe various aches, pains, and symptoms that I try to decipher as I’m listening from a distance. The children have the same fear of thermometers and stethoscopes as those in the states.

Once again, after triage, the patients wait in a line to see a medical professional. The doctors and physician assistants are separated by specialty: children, cardiovascular, women, etc. The medical professionals see each and every patient, looking at the intake sheet, asking about symptoms, and finally prescribing the necessary medicines. I watch one of the physician assistants as he works with the children. You can see the passion he has for his work as he takes the time to make each child comfortable, tickling them, laughing with them, and showing them that doctors are not to be feared.

The patients then wait in their last line to have their prescription filled, which sometimes can take hours. This is the main backup in the process. Each patient gives the students their sheet signed off by a doctor. Some may have one or two prescriptions, whereas others can have up to seven. Everything from vitamins for malnutrition, abendazole for parasites, antifungal cream for skin rashes to even cardio medicine is handed out.

After watching this whole process for only a few minutes it is clear how much an electronic medical record system is needed. If patients were each given a medical identification card with a scanable barcode or even more simply, a serial number, it would provide each patient with a personal identification. Then if each station had laptops connected through a local server and an electronic medical system, each patient could be tracked paperlessly throughout the entire process. We could begin filling proscription right after the doctor hits enter, decreasing the bottleneck. But more importantly we could pull previous records for patients during their visits to track their health when proscribing medications. Also, once our CHW teams and clinics are in place, they too could have access to these medical records to track critical patients in the area. We would finally have the ability to track the progress of our communities.

We have already somewhat developed a data system for our medical records, but we need something more. We need something expandable, we need something that anyone could use and that has already been proven to work. Solution: open source medical record systems, more specifically OpenMRS. We have started researching how we can incorporate this software, now it all just comes down to configuring it for our specific setup.

When you need a solution for your organization, is it better to do it yourself or outsource it to another organization that is already doing it? When does the efficiency of partnership out weight the power of ownership to shape something specifically for your organization?

With the political situation still unsettled in Honduras, travel to communities has been hampered on days of protest to insure the safety of our staff. When work in the communities is put on hold, it means being flexible to take on new projects and to rearrange our schedules to continue making a difference while in the office. This week, I took on a side project of reviewing a list of organizations that work in Honduras to find possible avenues of collaboration and discover best practices that Global Brigades may also benefit from.

Many people criticize the non-profit industry for continuously re-creating the wheel by developing more organizations that do the same work, rather than working together. The health work that we do in Honduras is not an exception to this. As I was reviewing the list and studying the websites of each organization, I realized that there are many other organizations doing health work in Honduras. I found that many are doing the same work as Global Brigades, but even more so, organizations whose programs would compliment ours. I began to wonder why we weren’t already working with them.

During the two hour drive out to our pilot community health worker village today, I sat in the back of our pick-up truck, sharing my thoughts about NGO partnership with a recent graduate from UC Berkeley. Together, I as a business student and her as a pre-med student, we used our experiences in each area to brainstorm and discuss why it is that many organizations don’t collaborate, and more importantly how we, as Global Brigades, can do more to collaborate.

Our main take away was this: everyone in the field agrees that we’re all working together towards the same cause, yet there is a disagreement on how this should be done and want the power to be able to do it how they think is right. With the joy felt in helping others, many feel a sense of pride that their work is making a difference, and with that comes a crave for ownership to continue doing it their way. Sure, all organizations want to learn more about how they can increase their impact and help more, but most often, organizations want to do it themselves once they learn how.

During this conversation we came to agreement that we need more specialized physicians to come on Medical Brigades to provide specific treatments to the health problems plaguing our communities. All it would take is another volunteer to be dedicated to recruiting more doctors, surgeons, etc. because all of the logistics and infrastructure needed is already in place. But the real question is: do we do it ourselves or do we work with another NGO that already only recruits certified medical professionals for medical work in Honduras? How do you get two organizations with completely different models to work together for the same cause? How do you convince someone that you are a collaborator and not a competitor?

When communities are used to having 'gringos' constantly come in to make change and then leave without fulfilling their promises, how do you show a community that you're not just another  one week non-profit, and that you will indeed follow through?

With the political tensions finally calmed, we were able to travel out to the community today. Global Brigades is implementing a new community health workers  (CHW's) program in their communities, and I was able to help out our CHW team as they are running a pilot on their first community. Since we weren't able to travel out to the communities because of roadblocks and safety precautions, the CHW team is left with a time crunch to survey their communities, hire CHW's and pilot their program to make sure it can be sustained after they leave in four weeks. With little time left to complete everything the CHW team wanted to do, I went out with them to help map GPS coordinates of the homes in their pilot community.

My partner and I walked around inputting location information into a spreadsheet, using a phone to get the GPS coordinates of the homes and a camera to take pictures. We then will take this information along with the surveys completed by the CHW team to map the communities and their basic information onto Google Earth. By mapping out the community we can sketch out a map of the community and have information on exactly where all of the families are for future medical reference.

While we were mapping the community, the CHW team was finishing up their sample of surveys, asking families about various health issues, from basic colds to even contraception. After learning more about the trends of the communities I was surprised to find out that other non-profits had come into this exact community in the past to try to help with their healthcare, and left them without accomplishing much. After a community meeting today, it was evident that their was hesitation among the community members. All we can do is show that the program we are doing is worth their time and effort and hope that they trust us help them.

September 2008 was the first time I came to Honduras on behalf of Global Brigades. I spent the first full day in the country completely immersed in communities, learning first hand the operations of our Health programs. The night before our trip into the communities I spent packing bags of medicine with our Medical Brigades chapter from the University of Washington. Over and over again, I counted the same quantity of pills to be separated into plastic bags and labeled with dosages. I also sat with a Public Health Brigades chapter as they reviewed the method for constructing ecostoves. I watched the excitement of the groups as they prepped all night for their first day out in the field.

The next day we was long and exhilarating. I spent the first couple of hours helping a Medical and Dental brigade set-up and sat back to watch dozens of community members line up to be seen by our doctors. I was astonished to hear that some women had walked over 3 hours to receive something as simple as tylenol. The process was very structured, you walk up to intake, give your name and information, go into triage to have your blood pressure and other stats taken, then see a doctor who proscribes you and sends you to the pharmacy station to pick up your meds. Yet, something that one would see as simple is the difference between life and death for some of these people.

After being completel awed by the Medical brigade, I then spent time with a Public Health brigade team as the constructed ecostoves for some of the people in the same village. After seeing hundreds of patients, Global Brigades saw that a large problem in these communities is respiratory related, and after spending time in the communities, they saw that it mostly came from the stoves that were being used. With lack of access to information or education, some people in the communities don't realize that the smoke being trapped causes their respiratory problems, and more so the design of their stoves takes an excess amount of wood and a long time for cooking. To combat this problem, Public Health Brigades was formed to find solutions to problems like this; to build ecostoves, latrines, and any thing else that could help these communities.

A few months before I came to Honduras I went to a event hosted by the Seattle Microfinance with our CEO of Global Brigades. The event was showcasing a Seattle-based organization called Microenergy Credits. The firm bundles carbon credits for different non-profits so that they can be sold on the carbon credit market. After listening to their presentation, we instantly knew that our Public Health program could benefit from their services. Now, only a few months later and after a few emails and phone calls, we are beginning to track our ecostoves in our communities to start receiving carbon credits. We have to continuously make sure that the ecostoves we put in place are working, and we randomly get audited once a year. However, with some of our communities being hours away, and with the number of ecostoves being implemented growing exponentially, how do we track everything? What is the most effective way to make sure that the ecostoves are working and so that they money received from the carbon credits is worth all the tracking?

During my second day in Honduras we gathered around a white board to have what would be a four hour brainstorming session about community follow-up.

I have my first few sips of coffee and day-dream a little as we wait for others to join the discussion. I imagine sitting at our apartment in Tegucigalpa with the 180 degree view of the city. I think to myself, “86% of this country is in poverty – who am I to say what these people need or want?” As an American from a good family and home, what do I know about the lives of those in poverty?

I’m drawn into the start of the conversation as my caffeine kicks in. We begin discussing our new program, “consejos de brigadas,” which was constructed by our team in the states as our exit strategy and follow-up plan for communities to allow them to be self sustaining without us.

The idea revolves around creating community councils with specific roles to maintain the infrastructure we’ve helped them develop in their communities. Community health workers with access to our medical records, water advisors to monitor the water systems, someone to maintain and build more ecostoves, latrines, etc. Simple, right?

It’s no longer good enough to come into communities, improve health for a while, leave, then do it again, and again, and again. Because the real question is, why do they need this in the first place? And how can we enable them to do it themselves? Our medical brigade doctors spend countless hours prescribing over the counter meds for headaches, and other non-emergency issues. What about those that are truly sick? How can we reach them? We need to start empowering communities to medicate themselves at the most basic levels so that our medical brigades are providing care to those with serious conditions. But, we can’t do this when communities are without doctors or nurses to turn to and have no means for paying for the medicine.

Our staff in Honduras begins telling us that community councils are not as easy as we might think. You can’t just come into a community bringing a new idea and expect them to just embrace it. Even more so, those communities that do have councils don’t seem to be working. When the people is these communities are worrying about putting food on the table, and when there are dozens of other NPOs doing work, how do you keep council members accountable and how do you make it all work? So, no, it is not that simple.

The visiting and in-country staff instantly go head-to-head debating the best way to approach this sustainability challenge. You can feel the passion in the room as voices are raised, arguments are made, and plans are reworked as we fight for the poorest and most neglected citizens of Honduras.

I sit back and admire the situation. We have med students, doctors, business minds, and students in the room. All could be back in the states making money while, not having to worry about taking their malaria pills and living in a much more comfortable situation. Yet, we we’re all in this office. We’re all brought here by our common passion: to improve the lives of others.

So how do we solve their problems? We don’t. We cannot solve this without the communities. Because as Americans, we don’t know what they need or what will work. There is no “cookie cutter” fix for families who live day to day wondering how they are going to survive to see the next. We need to go back to the drawing board and bring the communities with us.

Now that I have your attention, I can tell you what it’s really like here in Tegucigalpa, Honduras. Over the last week, in the midst of what the media is calling an unofficial ‘coup d’état’, with sensationalized reports of armed men walking the streets, and violent protestors; I haven’t seen a single person passing the streets in military fatigues. And for what? Your viewership. What are the ramifications of this hysteria? Under usual circumstances, it would be hard to quantify, but through my leadership position with Global Brigades this summer, I can accurately report what the true impact is.

Because of fear, in the worst case scenario more than 300 volunteers doing health and water projects through Global Brigades in August are in jeopardy from being realized. Students will be cancelling flights and the poorest of poor will not be assisted. 19 medical brigades will be cancelled – that translates to more than 40,000 patients being seen. 5 water brigades will be cancelled, so now more than 1,000 people will not have access to a clean water systms. 4 public health brigades will be cancelled, so dozens of eco-stoves and latrines will not be built. These are villages that make less than $1 a day… But at least you will be entertained.

I’m writing this, because I hope that there is a best case scenario. I hope that people realize that we should not jump to conclusions based on emotional media rhetoric, but we should wait for the facts to react judiciously. I for one am not leaving. Until the U.S. embassy tells me that it is necessary, I’m going to continue to help.

Does it start with a simple idea that grows into something bigger or does it start with passionate people looking for a way to change the world?

There is not one main story that can encompass the history of Global Brigades. Instead, its history is comprised of a myriad of people with different passions who came together to combat the health and development problems that plague the majority of the world.

Imagine a group of idealistic students, passionate doctors, and suitcases full of medicine.

In 2004, Global Brigades began with pre-med students who simply wanted to improve the quality of healthcare in the second poorest country in the western hemisphere. Instead, this group would find themselves as the initiators of a social movement led by students. Two of the pre-med students joined with their group organizer who was raised as an orphan in Honduras, a recent business school graduate from USC, and a patent lawyer in California. The worlds of these five idealistic leaders collided to form the legal entity of what would become Global Brigades, the world’s largest student-led global health and sustainable development organization.

Global Brigades, a U.S. 501(c)3, creates a mutually beneficial short-term exchange program that improves the quality of life for disadvantaged people in the developing world, while empowering the volunteers who initiate them. GB offers beneficiaries two holistic programs: health (medical, dental, water sanitation, and public health brigades) and development (business, law, architecture and environmental brigades).

Health brigades are implemented in Honduras, in villages that would not otherwise have access to medicine. Volunteers are encouraged to bring down a multi-disciplinary team to not only conduct medical/dental relief work, but to improve the water, sanitation, and over public health infrastructure. The volunteers have access to an electronic patient records system to monitor health trends and pull patient history.

Development brigades are implemented in Panama via several partner nonprofit organizations, such as the Peace Corps, that help identify projects and oversee them when the volunteers aren’t “brigading.” Volunteers from the four development disciplines work together to assist the microenterprises in the communities by providing business consultations, capital investments, legal guidance, and architectural designs while teaching the importance of environmental preservation and conducting reforestation projects.

So what does it take to start a social movement towards decreasing global poverty and improving our environment? It begins with basic ideas led by the passion of those who aren’t willing to surrender to the difficulties of how to accomplish these daunting tasks.

As Paul Hawkens recently said during his commencement address to the 2009 graduates of the University of Portland,

There is invisible writing on the back of the diploma you will receive, and in case you didn't bring lemon juice to decode it, I can tell you what it says: You are Brilliant, and the Earth is Hiring. The earth couldn't afford to send recruiters or limos to your school. It sent you rain, sunsets, ripe cherries, night blooming jasmine, and that unbelievably cute person you are dating. Take the hint. And here's the deal: Forget that this task of planet-saving is not possible in the time required. Don't be put off by people who know what is not possible. Do what needs to be done, and check to see if it was impossible only after you are done.

For daily updates on our recent projects in Honduras, follow @vanessaclopez on Twitter.

“What gets you out of bed in the morning? What is it that you want to achieve in this world? You know, they say that if you write down your goals and continuously remind yourself of them, you are more likely to accomplish them. Let me share three of my goals with you:

1. Donate 100 pints of blood before the age of 70.

2. Make partner at an accounting firm.

3. Be the change I wish to see in the world.

I want each and every one of you to dig deep and really ask yourself what makes a life worth living …”

I was a junior in business school, and was asked to stand among my fellow accounting students to state why service was important to me. I wanted to stress the importance of a life well balanced between personal career goals and social goals. It’s not enough to be a part of a company that is socially conscience. How can each and every one of us become socially conscious in our personal lives and strive to make a positive change in the world?

Little did I know, just one year later, even my goals would be tested. My world would be turned upside down, and two of my previous goals would become a distant memory. Frequent and future trips to malaria endemic countries have forced me to discontinue my goal to donate 100 pints of blood. Also, I decided that I wanted to be in a career that would give me as much business knowledge as possible so that I could transfer my skills to the social enterprise and non-profit sector, leaving me to take a career in consulting instead of accounting.

I now only have one goal left from my initial list. Like many students who have followed Mahatma Gandhi’s quote, I have adopted it as my purpose in life. Be the change I wish to see in the world.

I am Vanessa Lopez. I am 22 years old and a recent graduate from the University of Washington. Before venturing off into the business world in January, I’m ready to take my knowledge and create change.

As an ongoing volunteer for Global Brigades, I have seen and have been a part of the many challenges that face underdeveloped communities. One very pressing problem is the need for healthcare in rural villages and solutions for the underlying causes. This summer, I will be traveling to Honduras through Global Brigades to develop a new sustainable development program to combat this very problem that threatens the villages we volunteer in. The project is called “Consejos de Brigadas.” I will be working with a team to develop sustainable health councils in rural villages. The councils will provide primary healthcare combined with innovative health infrastructure and agricultural and microenterprise solutions via a microlending model. The idea is to have the health infrastructure and solutions (latrines, eco-stoves, water storage units, etc) perpetuate the primary health care delivered.

Our team has a tough feat ahead of us as we develop this new program, and I couldn’t be more excited to stand up for the challenge. I invite you to be a part of our fight to combat the healthcare problems in underdeveloped communities. Follow our blog and take one step further in becoming the change you wish to see in the world. Each week I will post a blog every Friday and Sunday to discuss the most urgent issues. We would like this blog to be an open dialogue and center for solutions to the life threatening problems that these villages are faced with everyday. Please post responses, questions, and any advice as we work together to solve these problems.

For daily updates on our project after I depart for Honduras on June 22, follow @vanessaclopez on Twitter. Please read our next post this Friday, June 12 to find out more on how Global Brigades started.