Several years ago I will remember sitting around with a new set of friends that I would be calling my classmates at our Class Dinner Friday Night at the ISIS Restaurant in Asheville, NC.
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| Newly Elected 2016-17 District Governors at the Friday night class dinner in November 2014. The bond between this group has only grown stronger! |
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Sitting around with 2016-17 President John Germ talking about membership,
attendance requirements, official visit requirements, and a class project
that all of us could participate in and kick off our year in 2016!
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Because 29 District Governors spent an evening of brainstorming, a class project was going to happen. Before we left that evening, we emailed President John Germ to find out what weeks would work to make sure we had the time locked in. The first week of July was locked in before the evening was over.
So what happened? All 29 Districts in Zones 33 and 34 contributed to a global grant that was matched to purchase equipment for a hospital in Jamaica. I'd never traveled to Jamaica and was looking forward to seeing some beautiful sites and participate in a global grant project that was going to kick off the year for all of us! 21 of the 29 District Governors traveled to Montego Bay to visit a local hospital and a home for girls as our projects.
Many of us arrived July 6, my birthday will never be the same!!! I can't think of a better way to spend my birthday. I think a day of service is so much better!! Friday morning we boarded a bus to travel to Cornwall Regional Hospital. As we rode on the bus the sights were absolutely AMAZINGLY beautiful to some that were horrific.
The hospital sits up on a hill. It wasn't what I had imagined at all. It was much busier than I expected and people were everywhere. It was 10 floors with people in the hallways waiting to be seen, rows and rows of people sitting in chairs in the "lobby" area of the clinics and the emergency room area I just don't have words for what I saw.
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| Cornwall Regional Hospital in Montego Bay, Jamaica |
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| Entrance to Cornwall Regional Hospital |
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| The back wall of Cornwall Regional Hospital |
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Touring Cornwall Regional Hospital. Hundreds of patients
waiting to be seen. |
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| Medical Records Office |
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How do they find anything with all of these files?
There are stacks of paper everywhere. Everything is kept by paper.
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Dr. Green showing the Intensive Care Unit to President John Germ.
The unit is closed due to an outbreak. |
What an eye opener experience for me and many others. Across from the Intensive Care Unit the operating room is located with the new equipment received from the global grant. This is where the new operating microscope, two slit lamps, visual acuity projectors, ophthalmoscopes and surgical equipment was delivered to Cornwall.
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| District Governors from 21 different districts are filled with joy to have this equipment at Cornwall. Rotary International President John Germ and his wife, Judy, joined us for this EPIC event! The people of Montego Bay will not have to wait for a year to have cataract surgery! We are missing one of our classmates on this trip too. We dedicated this to our classmate George Tyson. He was with us in spirit and looking down on us during this trip |
Cornwall Regional Hospital serves 500,000 people. The Department of Ophthalmology treats 10,000 people a year and now will be able to take care of the people of Montego Bay in a timely manner. Can you imagine having to have cataract surgery and having to be added to a waiting list that will take a year? Our eyesight is so precious and this equipment will allow doctors and nurses to treat more patients. Hopefully, no one will lose their sight now the physicians have the proper equipment to treat their patients.
All of this because we wanted to start our year off with a class project. We wanted to lead our districts by leading by example. We are all so proud to serve our districts! It was a GREAT day to be a Rotarian on Friday, July 8, 2016! This is what it looks like with Rotary Serving Humanity!
See how the newspaper reported our project in Jamaica
Stay tuned to find out what we did on Saturday, July 9th!
Pam
2016-17 District Governo
www.rotarypamlightsey.com
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