Abbott Canada provides their product for the fourth year!

Dr. Saifee Rashiq, Anesthesiologist approached Mr. Rob Krakauer, the Edmonton area District Manager for Abbott Anesthesia pharmaceuticals. CAMTA is pleased to announce that Abbott Canada has once again arranged for Abbott Ecuador to deliver six bottles of Sevorane to the Hospital Un Canto a la Vida in Quito Ecuador!


Thanks very much to Abbott for their generosity!  Sevorane is an essential medication to deliver safe and reliable anesthesia to our pediatric patients.  This gift will make a difference!

Happy New Year!

50 50 Draw yields over $900.00 to the lucky winner!

Today at the warehouse we did meet

to complete the 50 50.

Some friends and some members  

we all did attend

to comply with the rules of the draw.

The tickets were separated and stirred with a frenzy

by Gayle and Cori and Eileen.

One little girl had a moment of fun

as she drew the winner of the draw.

Some lucky friend of CAMTA will soon learn

that today is her lucky day!

For she'll go home richer with

$900 to her credit

whilst the kids and the adults in Ecuador Land

get straight feet and fresh hips from our gang!

One more draw next week:  Get your ticket now!

CAMTA: Smith and Nephew funds prosthesis requirements for the third time!

Hi All,

Just in from Ed Masson, our chief adult orthopedic surgeon is the following message.  It is wonderful to hear that our prosthetic requirements for the adult patients in Ecuador are fully funded for the THIRD year in a row!  Smith and Nephew are truly a PHILANTHROPIC company!  Check out their website at:  http://global.smith-nephew.com/master/6600.htm

This starts my weekend off on a very good note!  How about yours?

Thanks.
John

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Edward Masson
Date: 12 November 2010 14:43

Thanks very much Carol. That is great news for CAMTA and the poor people in Ecuador.

Take care,

Ed

On 2010-11-12, at 12:53 PM, "Young, Carol"  wrote:

Hello Dr. Masson

I am pleased to inform you that your submission to the Grants Committee for support of the CAMTA Mission from February 18 - March 7, 2011 has been approved.

We will be in touch with you to work out the logistics for this mission.

Carol Young

Executive Assistant 

Continuing Ed Co-Ordinator

Smith and Nephew Canada

--
Please consider a gift to help poor people with joint problems -- kids and adults -- in Ecuador!  View a video of the CAMTA mission at www.camta.blogspot.com !!

CAMTA Container Equipment in use at the Hospital Un Canto a la Vida

Hi CAMTA followers!
Click on the title of this blog entry to view the equipment from our container.  The container was shipped from Edmonton, Alberta in early 2010 and arrived just after our mission left Quito last year.
The hospital staff had a wonderful time unloading the equipment.  It was like Christmas they told us!
Now the equipment is in use in the new hospital.  Have a look!
Thanks.

More than a clubfoot: A family with great strength under difficult circumstance

Today, a seven month old baby is receiving surgery for his clubfoot.  The story of his family is extraordinary.  There have been tears shared at the Tierra Nueva Hospital over the circumstance of this child's family.

Below is a picture of the translator Miha from the Cotapaxi School holding little Brandon.  We decided we cannot show you mother.  As you read on you will understand.

Brandon is a beautiful baby with one clubfoot.  He has no idea what his older sibs and his parents have experienced.

Here you can see that clubfoot.  It was casted at another hospital with one cast each 8 days for 12 consecutive castings.  But the foot has not straightened.

Here is Fern Cannon, our Ecuadorean cultural connection and a member of CAMTA since it's inception.  She collected the story from the mother.  She's carrying Brandon to the operating room.

In the operating room, Anesthesiologist Teresa Eliasson places a caudal block for post-operative comfort into Brandon.  Anesthesia Technician Glenn Day monitors the anesthesia and respirations.

Here's the monitor of hemoglobin and oxygen saturation from Masimo.

Brandon has four older sibs.  The parents and the first two children lived in Colombia and are now refugees in Ecuador. The last three children have been born in Ecuador since they became refugees here just over two years ago.  They operated a farm in Colombia and the FARC guerillas demanded payment of $250 per week.  The family and the other partner in the farm paid the extortion monthly for two years until they couldn't afford to pay it.  The guerilla's killed the business partner and stated they would kill the entire family if payment wasn't made the next day.

Brandon under anesthesia for his clubfoot surgery.

The family abandoned their property, their house, their car and took only two plastic bags of clothing.  They took a taxi to the border with Ecuador and asked for refugee status.

L to R: Drs. Tim Carey, Scott Wiens.  Nurse Donna Brown in background with Dr. Marc Moreau

They were admitted to a refugee camp but there wasn't enough food for the whole family so the parent's gave their food to the children.  One parent went without food each day.

L to R:  Donna Brown, Marc Moreau, Scott Wiens, resident in orthopedics, Tim Carey, pediatric orthopod, Jaime McInnis

Here's the instruments used in Brandon's surgery.

Now the family live in Quito Sur and the children stay in the one room apartment with no kitchen or bathroom while the parents work on the street selling cookies and candies. In the bedroom there is Katherine who is 10, Valeria who is 8, Joanide who is 4 and Michael, age 3 and Brandon who is 7 months.  The children are receiving only what education the mother has time for in the evenings: reading, writing and basic math.  They have seen guerillas they recognize on motorbikes in Quito and thus they fear for the lives of their children.  For this reason the children never, NEVER leave the building in which they live.  The father knows faces and names of terrible people in Colombia.

Thanks for reading.

John

Starting soon: CAMTA's "Gold Medal Equivalent" Mission 2010!

Hi All,

There has been some packing activity this last weekend, the final weekend before Team One departs on CAMTA Mission 2010.  There are 51 mission bags for week one plus probably 19 personal bags shared by the team members.  In addition the pedipods from Ottawa, Jay and Lou are each bringing a hockey bag with fibreglas casting material.  Week two has far fewer bags since they are only bringing top-up supplies.  But there may be a few calls in the days before they depart to bring down something we have forgotten!

On Monday, Marc Moreau and I appeared on Global TV Edmonton's morning news for a three minute interview with Mike Sobel.

Today I picked up three banners with the new CAMTA logo from Perry Gould of Digital Print and Imaging in Sherwood Park, Alberta.  Instead of two banners he supplied three at no extra cost.  He is another of the generous supporters of CAMTA who have provided free items or deeply discounted services.  Thanks, Perry! 

Wednesday, a group of seven CAMTA members will be presented to the Alberta Legislative Assembly by MLA Mr. George Rogers.  This is a first for CAMTA!  

On Thursday evening, a group (being organized by Matt Moreau) will load the cube van being provided by Marc Tardif of Echo Promotions and being driven by his Dad and CAMTA member Al Tardif.

Then in the wee hours of Friday we will assemble at our various airports and leave for the CAMTA Mission 2010.  Let us work hard together to deliver a "gold medal equivalent" to our patients in Ecuador!

Thanks.
John

Our patients will need crutches! Donate your old ones!

Merry Christmas Everyone!
Here's hoping you had a great time with family and friends.

The physiotherapists are preparing crutches for our patients in Quito.  Just about every patient -- whether a child or an adult -- needs crutches after surgery.

Please Please Please -- check your basement or your garage for old pairs of crutches that we can modify and pack for CAMTA's Mission 2010 in Quito, Ecuador.

Bring those crutches to any YMCA in Edmonton between January 1st and January 8th.  Click on the title to find out the exact locations for those YMCA's.

Thanks everyone for being generous with your old crutches!  Help kids and adults regain mobility!  Let children return to playing soccer and adults return to gainful employment.

Thanks.

Surplus computers released to CAMTA!

This week we were pleased to learn that the provincial government has released 20 surplus older computers and 4 printers to CAMTA for shipping in our container to the Hospital Canto a la Vida in Quito, Ecuador.
The 3 pallets of gear are already shrink-wrapped and ready for shipping.  They will be transported by truck to Saskatoon for loading into the CAMTA container.

The container is currently being certified as seaworthy.  Then it will be fully loaded and the inventory lists sent for approval and customs documentation before final shipping to Ecuador.

This is indeed a great week leading up to Christmas!

CAMTA Container departs for Saskatoon!

Today at 1200h in Edmonton the CAMTA Container received it's final load of hospital equipment at the Misericordia Hospital.  Matthew Moreau led the group which included Jason Tong, Gayle Hiebert, Deb Chalupa, Heather Perl, Pauline Worsfold and Judy Black.
After receiving an operating room table and some Bair hugger machines that were donated by Associated Health Systems, the container moved to our CAMTA warehouse for some more light items.  Leroy, the volunteer driver from the IMED program of the Canadian Food for the Hungry in Saskatoon is driving home on Highway 16E as I write.


Staff at the IMED warehouse will reload, inventory and prepare the container to head to Ecuador.  The equipment will be used at the Hospital Canto a la Vida of the Tierra Nueva Foundation.  Check out the IMED program here!

A new voyage for CAMTA

In August, the CAMTA executive made a decision to support the Hospital Canto a la Vida of the Tierra Nueva Foundation in Quito, Ecuador by supplying hospital equipment to outfit the beautiful new building.

It's been a flurry of phone calls, visits to the hospital equipment depot and arrangements.  But finally today

 IT ALL STARTED TO HAPPEN!

Just after 10 this morning our wonderful three year old container arrived to receive the surplus hospital equipment that has been stored at Alberta Hospital Edmonton.  The volunteer team was ready and waiting.

Pablo Valenzuela, Sara Irving, Jason Tong, Andy Escalona and Matt Moreau were ready for the heavy lifting.  Glenn Day and I were there for the logistics.

There is no proper loading dock.  The gang lifted the stretchers one by one into the container.

Matthew rolled them to the back and locked the wheels.

Glenn helped the forklift driver load the operating room tables one by one onto the forklift.

Pablo rolled the operating room light into the back of the container.

I provided sidewalk supervision whilst the gang secured the neonatal beds with their tall overhead lights.

Here's Jason and Sara tightening up the belts!

And then with the mission accomplished, we poised with the truck driver for a photograph.

back:  Andy Escalona, Matt Moreau, Pablo Valenzuela, Jason Tong, Ken our truck driver

front:  Glenn Day, Sara Irving.

in the background:  CAMTA's FIRST CONTAINER SHIPMENT!!!!

Glenn then ceremoniously (mischievously) secured the container.

And to make sure there were no surprises and all arrangements were complete I followed the truck driver all the way to the Overland Container Service yard.  Here's the container going into storage!

What happens now?

In about 10 days we hope that more surplus hospital and computer equipment will be available.  We are waiting on paperwork!  And then the Canadian Food for the Hungry IMED staff will bring their trailer and tractor from Saskatoon to pick-up that container and return it to their home base for unloading, inventory and reloading with even more great hospital items like beds, stretchers, anesthetic machines and an ultrasound machine or two.  We even have two dental offices!  After customs paperwork we hope to ship the container by sea with arrival inland at Quito early in the spring.

Check out the Canadian Food for the Hungry IMED program here.

Watch for more news as the container program progesses!

Thanks.

John

A great big thanks to Big Steel Box

Today, Eileen and I drove out to the grounds of the Big Steel Box outlet in Edmonton.  They specialize in containers for conversion to offices or storage space but also for shipping overseas.
Corey Kirzinger is the local manager and he phoned his boss in BC, company owner Mr. Ryan Siebenga and asked him to authorize a container at cost for us!  It wasn't a problem!
CAMTA now owns a three year old seaworthy container that is 40 feet long.  Into the container on Thursday, a crew of CAMTA members will load surplus hospital equipment for the Tierra Nueva's new hospital in Quito, Ecuador called the Hospital Canto a la Vida.
The container will go into storage here in Edmonton until more items are available in one or two weeks time.  And at that time, a volunteer driver will come from Saskatoon's IMED Canadian Food for the Hungry Warehouse to pick it up.  After packing for the long train and boat and truck voyage to Quito we are hoping to have the container in the hands of Dra. Patricia Jarrin of the Hospital Canto a la Vida just before or after we are at the hospital in February.

Dear John and all Camta friends,

Is a pleasure for me to have again fresh news and photos in the Camta Blog. It is exciting to know that you are preparing a new Camta Mission to our country, Ecuador.Time goes very fast and now there are eight months since my right hip replacement. Everything is going well since my surgery. I was a good patient, and have made all my physiotherapy and also I was in Tierra Nueva Foundation every two months to have a control with Dr. Ordoñez. My last control was on September 26, and have made this pictures to show you. The only problem that I have now is that my left hip is beginning to hurt me.

Friends, you know all the good you do to us, the people who suffer from hip dysplacia. All we are waiting anxiously to see you again.

May Good bless you in this new Camta Mission 2009.

We are waiting you with open arms. See you in February 2009 to embrace you.

Your friend,

Pablo Montahuano Sosa