July 3, 2016
Things were pretty quiet in the office this week, in part
because of the events leading to and then the celebration of Canada Day, which
is officially on July 1st.
More particularly, it was quiet due to the fact that most missionaries
were on foot the last week or two of the month. Going to Lethbridge a couple of
weeks ago for Elder Nelson’s visit really ate into the total allotment of
kilometers that each driving missionary pair had for the month. Once their
allotted kilometers were gone they were on foot or on bikes. Somehow that also
translated to a lot fewer calls to the office. I had time to continue my
efforts to purge old and outdated stuff from the files.
One of my duties here in the mission is to serve as a
Mission Medical Advisor (MMA). I should say a few words about that. In each
mission the person who has primary responsibility for missionary health is the
mission president’s wife (MPW). She is assisted by former health care
professionals who are serving in the mission, or by retired medical persons
living in the area, but she is at the center of all things health related.
Many missions have people called to that mission with the
primary responsibility of assessing the health needs of the missionaries,
teaching health and hygiene, keeping track of the medical records of those
serving, and by maintaining a list of approved and prearranged facilities where
missionaries can be referred for care. Since there is no medical missionary
assigned here in the Canada Calgary Mission, Sister Miles, knowing of my past
career in medicine, asked that I receive the same training offered to those who
are called as health care missionaries. I did this in Salt Lake City prior to
Kathy and I going to the MTC. The training focused on acquainting those serving
with the Church insurance program, treatment policies, how to arrange
referrals, how to use the 24-hour advice line the Church maintains, the purpose
of and how to work with Area Medical Authorities (AMAs - physicians who serve
to advise a whole cluster of missions), and the variety of problems
missionaries have including the mental health issues of depression and anxiety
and the many ways these problems are manifest.
Now more to the point; MMAs and AMAs don’t actively treat
the missionaries as patients; rather they see, evaluate, and make
recommendations to the MPW (and to the missionary) for treatment, which then,
if needed, is arranged with an actual medical clinician in the local area. As
implied, not all missionary health complaints require being seen by a local
physician. This week, for example, I saw several missionaries at the request of
the MPW. One Elder had injured his finger playing basketball on P-Day. No
specialist treatment seemed indicated so the finger was splinted and will be
watched. A Sister has had knee pain apparently due to increased walking now
that nicer summer weather is here. This was found to be a hamstring bursitis
and did not prove to be associated with her knee joint. Localized treatment
measures, a short course of anti-inflammatories, and some stretching exercises
should gradually help her, so no referral to an orthopedist was felt to be
needed. Another missionary has numbness and tingling of the arm, either right
or left depending on which shoulder he carries his backpack. He should do well
by carrying a lighter load and by holding the bag by the hand strap instead of
using the shoulder strap (in the military we call this “rucksack palsy”).
Another missionary was seen earlier with a complaint of recurrent ingrown great
toenails. He was referred to a local podiatrist who performed a toenail
reduction procedure. We are
following his progress and healing. And tomorrow I will accompany an Elder home
to the Salt Lake airport with some health related problems that are not
resolving. (I’ll probably have more to say about the trip in next week’s blog.)
Canada Day is not celebrated with quite as much fanfare as
the people in the U.S. celebrate the 4th of July but it is a
national holiday so most offices and many businesses were closed. We did keep
the mission office open but had few calls. We had Elder and Sister Peppinger
join us for dinner here in our apartment that evening and afterward we went up
to the 17th floor observation area of our building where we enjoyed
the beautiful sunset and view of the downtown area. This would have been a
great vantage point to watch the fireworks downtown, but, as the fireworks
wouldn’t start until 11:00 p.m. (remember how late it stays light here in the summer),
we gave up and called it a night before the fireworks began. I will include some pictures taken from
the observation area.
Yesterdy it was such a beautiful day I decided to take a long run (actually much of it was walking as well) along the southern side of Glenmore Reservoir and around the western end where the Bow River suns into the reservoir, an area called Weaselhead. It is so still and nice except for the sounds of nature and the occasional sound of an overhead jet or helicopter. It will be come a favorite place to run and I hope to eventually make my way all around this very large reservoir, but this will be in stages as the distance is too far for me to attempt to run it in one day. Even by bike it takes hours to go all the way around the reservoir.
Last night we had a special evening out with President and
Sister Miles, the Peppingers, and the Sefciks – all missionary couples with
whom we work so closely. The Sefciks are from Calgary and made us aware of a
popular local dinner theater called Stage West, so some time ago we picked a
night and made reservations for a production called, “Legends of Rock and
Roll”. It was wonderful! The dinner proved to be a huge buffet of salads,
fruits, meats, fish, poultry, breads, and deserts. The dining room looked onto a
large stage where the show took place after an hour or so of eating. The desert
bar remained open through the intermission. I will include a few pictures from
Stage West as well.
Today in Church we got to stand and sing all verses of “O
Canada”. While I had heard the first verse multiple times before, it was a
treat to sing all of the verses and ponder the meaning. Like the “Star-Spangled
Banner”, we get familiar with the first verse but the others verses have such
great meaning and emotion. Anyway, it was wonderful to sing all of the verses.
Truly Canada and the U.S. have been blest nations. The future survival of good
and right in both nations is of concern to me. I hope you will join with me in
praying and working for reason and right to prevail. I shudder to think of what
the next four years will bring since both U.S. presidential candidates are
prime examples of greed and corruption; two people who feel that they are above
the law. Truly, how did this happen that we have two such horrible choices?! To
quote from Alma 60:9-10 – “And now behold, I say unto you, I fear exceedingly
that the judgments of God will come upon this people, because of their
exceeding slothfulness, yea, even the slothfulness of our government, and their
exceedingly great neglect towards their brethren…… For were it not for the
wickedness which first commenced at our head, we could have withstood our
enemies that they could have gained no power over us.”
Elder Thorley
No comments:
Post a Comment