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This site combines news and information from all programs and initiatives in one place. You can also find the blog by visiting our new website at www.ftccanada.ca. The new website will feature up to date information on our work in Canada and around the world.

"Scugog helping hands stretch to foreign land" by Dr. Steve Russell (printed in the Port Perry Star)

newsdurhamregion.com

"From Scugog to the slums of El Salvador" by Dr. Steve Russell (printed in the Port Perry Star).

www.newsdurhamregion.com

Check out this story about Dr. Cross and his team (printed in the Milton Canadian Champion):

www.miltoncanadianchampion.com

Every medical-dental trip inevitably involves a camera (certainly more than one) and a high quality video camera.

On the first trip to Honduras we were fortunate to have a camera person with 25 years experience! The result was terrific footage of the team in action. On this last team trip, we had another experienced camera person so we acquired good footage and were able to create the following video:



The video and an accompanying slide show are give to the team members at a reunion event. The most recent reunion was held in Port Perry, ON on June14th. A considerable number of our team professionals reside in "The Port".

Please look for new posts about future team trips ... and thank you for partnering with us.

Check out more videos from FTC Canada at YouTube!

The Best of El Salvador

The El Salvador Medical-Dental project was my first with FTC Canada, and my first experience visiting a developing country in this way. At first concerned about what services I, a person with no medical or dental training could offer (I later learned that there a many things that a person who wants to help can do, no matter what their skills), I was pleased to be asked to document the trip with photographs, videos and blog entries.

Leading up to the trip, I tried to prepare myself for what I imagined I might experience. I thought that I would probably see a lot of things that would make me very sad, things that would disturb and upset me, and things that would make me feel very guilty about the privileges and opportunities I have as a Canadian.

I was wrong.

I did see things that made me very sad. I did hear stories that disturbed me, like that of the young woman who suffered extensive keloid scarring after her husband drunkenly took a knife to her many years ago. I did feel guilty, after being invited into a woman’s hut in Somalia, and saw how very, very little she had. Her experience is so far removed from my own that it took several minutes for the level of poverty she lives in to actually register for me. When it did, I was overcome.

So yes, in these very poor communities, there is sadness, and there is suffering, and there is loss, but I was wrong in the fact that more than all of these things, there is love.

I saw a tremendous amount of love in the way Marcos, an 87 year-old woman, walked for hours in order to seek medical care for her adopted son who was unable to walk the distance himself due to his cerebral palsy. I saw love in the community centre in Amayito, run by a woman named Virginia who dedicated herself to providing an oasis of safety and education in a violent, gang-ridden area. I saw love in the orphanage in Remar, where children removed from abusive environments were given a safe, happy home in which to grow and flourish, and to know and share love.

I saw love in mothers and fathers holding their children. I saw love in the smiles and laughter of the people we met who have nothing but each other, and still are thankful.

And I saw love, compassion and care from every single member of the Medical-Dental team.

The morning before our first clinic, Ken Dick spoke briefly to the team about how it was our job, above all, to be a beacon of light and hope for the people we met, through the care and compassion we gave them. What I have learned on this project is that they were also a beacon of light and hope for us, in their tremendous capacity to love.

I saw a little bit of the worst of El Salvador, but I believe that more importantly I saw much of the best. I feel honored to have been invited to witness and document these great moments of love.

About Julie Puckrin
Julie Puckrin is a Canadian film and television writer, living in Vancouver BC. A frequent guest lecturer at the Vancouver Film School, her credits include work in reality television, animation, and short film.

Saturday April 25, 2009 – Day 5 Clinic

Somalia is a slum. It is a collection of 750 families, living in huts made from any combination of scavenged metal, wood or canvas, in an inner city squat in San Salvador. Some families are fortunate enough to have 10 by 10 feet huts with some basic furniture and electricity stolen from the city. Others have significantly less; sometimes only a small pallet on the floor for the whole family, in less than 4 by 6 feet of space, with no electricity, windows, water, or washroom facilities.

Their story is a sad one. Some time ago, a man claiming to be the landowner came to Somalia offering to sell the families the land their huts were on for $15 USD each. Hopeful to be landowners, many managed to scrape this significant amount of money together. After paying, they discovered that the man was not the landowner at all, and that they had devastatingly lost their hard-earned money to a con artist. He fled and was never found.



Today was a very difficult day for the team, both physically and emotionally. Physically, medical, dental, pharmacy and distribution were set up outside under tarps in the few open spaces to be found in between huts; having to rely on a gas generator to power the dental clinic. At one point, ominous clouds and thunder threatened to cut the dayshort. Emotionally, the team was overcome by the extreme poverty we were witnessing, and many of us had to take a moment to pause, to collect ourselves and continue on.

We met Alex, a 34 year-old man with a bullet still lodged in his head from the civil war. He requires anti-convulsive drugs daily. We met Mercedes, a 23 year-old woman with a rare allergy to the sun. Any area of her skin exposed to the sun becomes swollen, dry, painful and split. Her face and hands have the scars from suffering this condition her entire life.

There was also Dorotea, a 46 year-old woman whose right leg never developed properly, and is significantly shortened and misshapen. When Dorotea was 14, she fell and broke her good leg; after surgery to repair it, she developed gangrene and had to have it amputated below the knee. Today we were able to treat her for parasites and an infection, and also to make her a little more comfortable in an unexpected way. The tops of her plastic crutches were extremely hard and hurt her under her arms. We were able to modify her crutches with carefully wrapped layers of bandages and gauze to provide padding. She was very happy.



But perhaps the patient we were most affected by was Maria, a 52 year-old woman who came to see the dentist. After having a tooth extracted, Maria became faint, dizzy and was shaking. At first doctors thought this was due to an untreated blood pressure problem and heat exhaustion. Upon further investigation we discovered that moments before having her tooth extracted, Maria had learned that her 10 year-old grandson had been shot in a drive-by gang shooting, and was currently at the hospital in surgery.



Today’s clinic in Somalia was the final day of the FTC Canada 2009 El Salvador project. The medical and dental teams saw a staggering 889 people today. In four trips to Central America, over a period of two years, FTC Canada has provided care for over 12, 600 people.

After a long, tiring, often emotional but always rewarding week, these numbers remind us why such trips to countries in need are so very important. And so very much appreciated.

[About the El Salvador Blog: Julie Puckrin was a member of the team to El Salvador and contributed the photos and blog entries throughout the week.]