idealist.org

Our mission is to aid the indigent with health problems in Guatemala. Our founder set up 3 mission in Central America and after his death we continue to support the work at 5 Catholic clinics in Guatemala, in the rural villages of Santo Tomas la Union, Santa Clara, and San Lucas and in 2 clinics in the suburban town of San Juan Sacatepequez near Guatemala City. These are clinics for the absolutely indigent, most of whom are of Mayan descent and we provide pharmacutical, textbook, and equipment support. We supported a nurse midwife program in one of the rural clinics. In addition we have supplied one of the clinics with infrared tattoo removal equipment because tattoos are a frequent cause of unemployment and police-caused violence (in Guatemala, the police arbitrarily kill youth with tattoos thinking they are gang members). Our current goals are to improve the clinic equipment, to sustain the ongoing programs, to continue to send students to the clinics (to increase their awareness of developing world medicine) and through all of these means to improve the lot of the indigent in their health-care needs in Guatemala.