Reflections from the Guatemala (Med) Spring Break 2025 Team
April 4, 2025
By Bryson Lovorn
Nothing compares to the humble privilege associated with medical mission work. You cannot take the unique opportunity to simultaneously align yourself with the mission of God and take part in the brilliant work of medicine for granted. That said, glorifying the work is nothing other than a gross misinterpretation of the truth. There is nothing glorious about diagnosing a woman with cancer who will likely not have the money, opportunity, or access to seek treatment. There is nothing glorious about the silence befalling the clinic as a little girl sobs while having two teeth with periodontal disease removed. There is nothing glorious about playing soccer with children before treating them in a clinic shortly thereafter with parasitic and urinary tract infections from the water they have no other choice but to bathe in. Regardless, I am blessed to be the voice of our team, saying we have never seen God more clearly than in those Guatemalan villages. Moreover, we left every clinic day refreshed and spiritually replenished. It was humbling to pray over the woman who got a life-changing diagnosis. It was humbling to hold the little girl's hand as she squeezed mine, needing to know someone was there with her as she bolted her eyes shut in pain. It was an honor to see the children hand their antiparasitics and vitamin supplements to their parents and return to the garden to play with us. It was an honor to be intimately involved in humanity's beauty and participate in the service we believe God called us to do. Everyone who came through our clinic doors was a walking example of the beauty in God's creation, in both the rewarding and heart-shattering components of their care.
A common misconception about medical mission groups is that the members are going out to "save" people. That notion is both incorrect and misleading - in the context of practicing medicine. The goal of a medical mission should be to serve people and walk alongside them. The people of Guatemala have their ways of life and practices that have remained for hundreds of years. Western culture is known for arrogance and boasting a superiority complex. There's no room for this in the medical field, much less when you are trying to treat people who look unfamiliar and don't speak their native tongue. The people we saw in Guatemala have been without modern healthcare. Does that mean Western medicine isn't helpful to them? No. However, is it what they value? Also, no. The children demonstrated their lack of dependence by dropping their newly prescribed medications to rejoin the soccer game. The people of Guatemala value family, connection, and fellowship.
Lisa Dunham, a family medicine physician, and Kemmel Dunham recognized the Guatemalan people's needs and a way to satisfy them. Graciously funded by their home church, they set out to rural Guatemala to spread the Gospel and improve access to healthcare in underserved populations. Dunham did a year's worth of additional training to get licensed in Guatemala as a Family Medicine Physician. She practiced in the inpatient setting for six months in Guatemala City. She spent the other half of her training in rural outpatient care. Her mandatory placement led her to Chichicastenango (Chichi), specifically El Quiche. The couple fell in love with the people there, forming close bonds with local healthcare and environmental professionals.
After finishing her mandatory rural healthcare service, the Dunhams extended their stay in Chichi indefinitely. They established the Chichi location for Health Talents International (HTI) and ABC Kids in time. Health Talents International, a Church of Christ-centered organization, is a healthcare cooperative to bring increased access to healthcare for the people in the valleys and highlands of the country. ABC Kids works to solve a secondary systemic issue in Guatemala: education. Most people in the area don't progress past a "second-grade level" education. Children progress into laborious fieldwork, and women learn more practical tasks and how to prepare for motherhood. The ABC program emphasizes further education in these demographics and encourages students to study fields such as teaching, medicine, and engineering. These occupations create a better life while providing the necessary tools to give back to their communities. The Guatemalan Nurse Practitioner, Dentist, and Dental hygienist came from the ABC program. They followed the educational pipeline to completion and are currently giving back to the same communities they originally came from. The Dunhams followed these children through their academic journey and now collaborate with them to continue serving otherwise unknown groups of people. Their devotion to lives of servitude and continuous pursuit of the Kingdom of Christ are reminders that the Lord's providence extends past our imagination.
Furthermore, the gross misunderstanding that this trip is a "one-and-done run" is a disservice to the passion project the two have established. As of this year, Kemmel and Lisa celebrated twenty years in Chichicastenango. They are now integral community members, participating in local markets, operating multifaceted healthcare clinics, aiding school systems in educational reform, and working alongside agriculturalists to develop safer living conditions. Lipscomb's partnership with Health Talents International in Guatemala significantly contributes to fostering a better life for the people in the country. It's important to reiterate that this success did not come from people with a superiority complex. It came from two people passionate about curiosity, people, and the Gospel. Rather than one-dimensionally seeing a problem and finding a solution, they saw people they wanted to walk alongside and join in fellowship with. This perspective and cultural shift is evident and a hallmark of our mission trip to Chichicastenango. It was apparent from the moment our trucks approached the hotel.
I would be lying to you if I said the members of our group were not incredibly nervous as we pulled up to the hotel. Our first one and a half days spent in Chichi were for preparation and rest. We needed to ensure all clinical staff arrived and set our plans. Our first event was Sunday night when we gathered for a church service. We walked through the town square markets and crowded streets until we reached a small church. The church had been manufactured in a quaint two-story building. It looked nothing like the large, stand-alone churches in suburban Tennessee. The congregation hall was on the first floor, and wooden beams lined the floor on the left side. We all took turns grabbing plastic chairs to arrange into rows. We quickly had chairs lining the remaining surface area of the floor. People began filling in one by one. The chairs took on owners, and before we knew it, the room was packed in with a mixture of local people and Lipscomb team members.
The pastor began leading us in a word of prayer, then a sermon around being disciples of God. He broke his sermon into segments of English, Spanish, and Quiche. The English portions of his sermon were out of a children's NIV bible. The sermon, being in Spanish and Quiche, was fascinating in itself. However, the fact that the pastor preached to our team in English was remarkable. The worship service was broken into Spanish and English sections as well. The service was welcoming and very current, as our team members worried about how we would mesh with the local people. After the sermon, we stayed in fellowship with the locals and played with their children. Breaking the ice with the local people also broke the chains of our nervousness. The words of the pastor about discipleship and togetherness under the umbrella of Christ's love, coupled with the fellowship of the local people, set the stage for the week.
Monday marked the first clinic day. Regardless of our replenished spiritual glass and comfort in the welcoming nature of local Guatemalan people, our team still felt nervous. The culmination of months of preparation, many team meetings, and anxiety about the language barrier contributed to our nerves. Members of our team woke up at 5:00 am, just as the sun was poking its head over the distant rolling hills. We gathered on the hotel rooftop to watch the sunrise and mentally prepare for the day before us. We listened to the roosters hollering in the distance, admired the birds coming over the horizon, and inhaled the crisp morning air of the valley. We allowed ourselves to be baptized in God's morning creation instead of bottling up our nervousness. The Guatemalan healthcare workers joined us for breakfast that morning. More importantly, they joined us in a word of prayer. They prayed over us in Spanish, and many did not understand a word. However, the calmness that entered the room was felt by everyone present. If any of us felt like the extended love from the day prior was a fluke, we replaced it with thanksgiving. I still don't know what words were prayed over us, but God's love extends past language barriers. We gathered for a team meeting and assigned members to the leading campus clinic or mobile clinic. We said a final prayer, loaded up and left to serve. This order of events became our morning routine for the trip. Our days began with quiet moments to enjoy the Lord's creation, gather in fellowship, join hand in hand in prayer, and go out to serve, knowing the Lord was with all of us.
We made a routine out of our clinic days as well. We would arrive, greet, unload, set up, serve, break down, load, wish farewell, and disembark. The word routine could only apply to the day's layout because everything between those skeletal components was unique, perspective-changing, and spiritually awakening. Each clinic comprised medical, dental, counseling, and child-care groups. Medical was responsible for patient assessments, vital signs, triage orders, and recognizing the patient's primary complaint. The dental groups were responsible for a similar intake process, teeth cleanings, tooth extractions, and cavity fillings. We also had a family psychologist present with our team accountable for patient education, family therapy, and after-care, depending on the patient's emotional tolerance to the diagnosis.
Finally, we also had a group of students dedicated to caring for the many children brought to the clinics. In Guatemala, everything is a family affair, so entire families would come to be seen at our mobile clinics. Each station came with its own sets of perks and challenges. Medical was a great opportunity for us to communicate with people and address their concerns. The medical intake group was the first set of people to meet these people when they came to the clinic. The ability of our team to make those immediate connections was beautiful to witness. That said, it's hard not to mention the difficulty of pronouncing long Spanish names, asking them to perform specific necessary tasks, and communicating that it may be a bit of a wait to see a provider. Unfortunately, but fortunately, many complications stemmed from the people being overly talkative to us! They were not excessively talkative in a bad way, not in the sense of not enjoying conversation, but we couldn't speak that level of Spanish. The parents wanted to know about us and how life was in America. The children wanted to know what sports we liked, our favorite colors, and how many wives we had. The mothers would hand their babies over for us to hold. We would play soccer, American football, and tag with the kids. We would paint little girls' nails, and they would paint ours. My newly yellow and pink index fingers were, as they say, "muy bonita". The connection we could establish with the kids before seeing them in the clinical setting made all the difference.
In the clinical setting, we saw a variety of case types. We saw urinary tract infections, diabetes, parasitic infections, teeth that needed to be pulled, cancer diagnosis, and allergies. Those cases proved to be learning opportunities for us students and provided us with interesting conversations. However, it's essential to recognize these are people we are treating. It was unanimously agreed upon that dental was emotionally the most challenging place to assist. It never got easier having a smiling kid pop onto the exam table and leave, wiping the tears from their face. It also never got easier holding their hand while they winced at the anesthesia needle. I previously mentioned that the most brutal case of my week in Guatemala was assisting in a double tooth extraction. The little girl's teeth were so infected that the anesthetic agent didn't work as effectively, and her teeth bled profusely. She began sobbing the second she felt pressure. Her father sat on the other end of the exam table from me. He turned his head and began to tear up. Dr. Russel, one of our dentists, stoically continued until he completed the procedure. The whole clinic stood at a standstill as the little girl cried. Her cries silenced the clinic, and it felt as if my world stood still. The father later shook my hand and thanked me for holding his daughter's hand. That patient interaction will stay with me for the rest of my life. On the medical side of the clinic, we had another patient who was quickly diagnosed with a likely cancerous mass in her breast. She had been seen at another health clinic; however, she was given a low-bar diagnosis and referred to a hospital outside of her price range for follow-up care. Her persistence brought her to our mobile clinic. By God's grace, the physician she saw was Eric Lander, a Vanderbilt-trained and double-board certified doctor of Hematology and Oncology. The most qualified person we could have brought was there to diagnose her, and she also had the partnership of Dr. Lisa Dunham to ensure she would get follow-up treatment. After giving her a rundown of her treatment plan, Lander prayed over her. She was so calm throughout the whole interaction. The woman's relative and child comforted her. After receiving her prayer, she smiled at us, thanked us both, grabbed her child's hand, and walked out of the clinic. Lander and I reflected on the event later in the day and concluded that the most challenging part was not the diagnosis but the idea that there wasn't anything more we could do after she left. That said, we also recognized that God's providence placed him there and that the Dunhams had been there twenty years before providing her with the care she needed. The Lord laid his hand over our hearts that day, specifically hers. She did not persist about the unfairness of the situation, where to find follow-up care, or honestly, what the next steps were. The only thing she asked of us was that we would pray with her. The work of medicine goes a long way and is increasingly advancing, but nothing can outshine the reaped benefit of a spiritual connection between individuals.
It's easy to get caught up in the shock and awe of the heartbreak and hardship of medical care. After all, these people brought their ailments and hardships straight to us. That burden can weigh heavy, but we don't have to carry it alone. We saw God so clearly in our work in the clinics. Our team gathered every night in reflection on the day's events. We told of our worst and best moments. More importantly, we shared how we all saw God that day. We shared how we saw God in our setting, with patients, and with each other. Part of our team-building exercises preceding the trip was sharing our testimonies. I got to witness the handiwork of God firsthand and reflect on how people's testimonies shaped their experiences on the journey. Knowing I had the honor of being our team's journalist, I carefully noted each person's testimony. I wrote one sentence reflecting on each person's testimony and noted how their trips allowed them to grow further in their faith. Members on our trip who struggled with anxiety for the future found solace in their path, members who struggled with their childhood and working with kids found new joy in playing with the children, and people in spiritual drought found new springs of living water. As much as we hoped God would work through our hands, God worked on us through the lives of the Guatemalan people. Members who struggled with the anxiety of a language barrier found that their efforts to communicate were more than enough. We concluded that speaking in tongues means the Lord makes a universal language. We experienced that firsthand. We acknowledged that we had small glimpses into heaven through being at the clinic locations because people of all skin colors, backgrounds, stories, and faiths came together in love. We had an instance where we had limited time and excess patients. A staff member told us to prioritize the more emergent cases. However, we got through all the patients' needs before we had to load the trucks to leave.
We compared this to Jesus feeding the five thousand, him being greater than the bounds of time to make His will a reality. We had members who went into the trip hesitant to be around children, yet they left groups of children to seek out a single child straying from the group. Just as Jesus seeks out the one leaving the ninety-nine, they ensure that one lone child feels comforted. In our nightly reflections, we talked, laughed, cried, and cried some more—God's humbling and beautiful handiwork awestruck us daily. The Lord crafted such a brilliant team of individuals with unique experiences that would come together to form an incredible puzzle. The resulting picture was a beautiful scene of young men and women passionate about serving and doing the Lord's handiwork. A group of men and women called to be the salt of the Earth, as stated in Matthew 5:13.
We returned to the United States of America and Lipscomb University with new perspectives. We had the privilege to spend our spring break immersed in service. We witnessed both the brokenness and innocent beauty of God's creation, weathering us for future careers in healthcare. Truthfully, no amount of words can adequately describe or summarize the trip to Chichicastenango, Guatemala. As cliche as it sounds, you had to have to been there. That said, I can speak for everyone on the trip in saying that, in many ways, you CAN be there. Service doesn't come from grandiose mission trips to foreign countries or intense medical stories. Service to the Kingdom comes from serving God's people anywhere and everywhere. We all returned home with a burning passion to serve our local community, just like the healthcare professionals we worked with from the ABC program.
Furthermore, the people of Guatemala taught us that fellowship and togetherness are more important than any medical intervention we can provide. We all returned eager to retain our connection to each other as a team but vow to walk more intimately with our colleagues. We entered Guatemala with the expectation that we were to be the salt of Christ, but it turned out to be that the people of Chichicastenango left the savory taste of the Spirit in all of our mouths. I'm proud to say that we will continue to chase that sensation as we dedicate our lives to serving in our kingdom vocations.
On behalf of the Lipscomb medical missions team, Thank you, God, and thank you, Chichicastenango.
Clinical Staff: Lisa Dunham (MD), Eric Lander (MD), Ron Wiewora (MD), Nathan Russel (DDS), Tim Silvas (DDS), Zachary Felix (BSN RN), Wes Olley (BSN RN), Kemmel Dunham (HTI Central America Missions Director), Bode Teague (HTI US Missions Director), Drew Bennie (Interpreter)
Lipscomb Team Members: Cleyci (Leader), Wes (Leader), Ben (Student Leader), Abbie (Student Leader), Andrew, Ashlyn, Braxton, Eden, Emmy, Gulsin, Josiah, Joy, Madalyn, Maria, Riley, Bryson (Journalist)
Not a Trip
Category: Student Life