Patient Highlight: Kurungu, Kenya

“One day, one moment, one event, can change your life completely.” -unknown

Transformational education. Transformational healing. These efforts not only enhance the day-to-day lives of individuals, but they can dramatically improve the quality of life for communities around the globe.

Mission to Heal sees patients who experience something, no matter how small, that has impacted their body for a lifetime. A stick impaled in a foot that now makes it difficult to walk. A dental abscess that makes it impossible to eat. 

Or, in the case of one patient – a burn on his pinky that left him unable to use his entire hand. 

In 2019, Dr. Glenn and a team of Mission to Heal volunteers arrived in Kurungu, Kenya, at the Kurungu Dispensary. They started as usual – working alongside the local facility staff to screen patients and teaching them the necessary skills to do minor procedures.

Then, along came a 9 year old boy whose pinky and underside of his hand was burnt. The burn stretched from the tip of his pinky finger to the middle of his palm. The finger was curled, which affected his ability to grip anything at all using that hand. A single burn, a single moment, rendered an entire hand useless.

Working closely with the local medical staff, Dr. Glenn and his team performed a burn contracture release and a skin graft. This uncurled the patient’s pinky, and after his recovery, allowed him to have full use of his hand.

Four years later, in March 2023, Dr. Glenn was on his morning run outside of the Kurungu Dispensary, preparing for another day of teaching and operating. He noticed a teenage boy waving and coming towards him.

“Do you remember me?” The boy asked. He showed his hand to Dr. Glenn – it was the same patient from 2019! His finger was straight, not in the way, as it would have been without the operation he had four years earlier. 

This is why we return to previous mission sites. It’s important to continue to build relationships with the healthcare professionals we taught years before, and to check in on patients whose lives have changed after their recovery. 

One week with Mission to Heal provides a lifetime of healing for every community. It’s how we’ve worked for decades, and it’s how we’ll continue to serve each place we visit.

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