Mission to Mexico

Archives Admin · #1 (**permalink**) 04-03-2006, 10:41 AM

Optometrist Robert “Bob” Slider has practiced in Odessa for more than 30 years. But he gets teary when he talks about the four times he has worked in Mexico for only a few days at a time.

Slider and four other Odessans left Schlemeyer Field Thursday en route to Guerrero, Chihuahua, Mexico, to volunteer with the Crystal Foundation for the poor and medically underserved. They will return Monday.

Optometrist Javier Morales, ophthalmic operating assistant Libby Palma, and Bob Slider’s wife Betty Jo Slider also went on the trip. Pilot Bill Ritter volunteered to fly the team.

They joined about 40 other physicians and volunteers principally from Texas for several days of examinations and operations at Guerrero Clinic. Volunteers will see about 1,000 people and perform about 175 surgeries in four days, Slider said. The Crystal Foundation organizes the trip biannually, he said.
Dentists, plastic surgeons, chiropractors and other medical personnel will help the area residents at no charge or at a minimal charge, Slider said. The volunteers even have to pay their own way and pay to use the clinic, he said.

The 7,000 square feet clinic was built more than 10 years ago by funds from Rotary International and the local government, Slider said. The building has three operating rooms, eight general exam rooms, pre-operation and post-operation rooms and a recovery room.

But the large waiting room is the most crowded room. Some people ride a bus for six hours to get to the clinic, and there are usually 100 to 150 people in the waiting room at any time, he said. There are few complaints.

“They’re very patient,” Slider said. “More patient than in the United States.”
For some, it is their first time to have an eye exam, he said.

“Some of those people have really dense cataracts,” Slider said. “(An operation) turns the lights on.”

Morales has been on three similar medical trips in Haiti and the Dominican Republic where he has corrected cataracts, glaucoma, growths and blurry vision. Even a pair of glasses for a child makes for a changed life, he said.
“A lot of the kids have mentioned that they didn’t know trees have leaves,” Morales said. “A lot of these people, it’s their only chance at eye care.”
Odessan Lee Navarrete, a lab optician and manager at Vision Source, has helped at the Guerrero Clinic four times. She has put lenses into frames and delivered them to a clinic representative several times.

“It’s very poor,” Navarrete said of the populace. “Most of the people can’t afford to get glasses. You really appreciate what you have here.”
Navarrete said the patients are extremely grateful.

“They’re very sweet people,” Navarrete said. “When we go it’s like they worship us. They don’t get tired of thanking us.”

Volunteers work 12 to 13 hour days, but they don’t come back drained, Morales said.

“The main thing for us, it’s a big boost to our batteries,” Morales said. “We come back very recharged and happy to be back. These trips really make you appreciate the U.S. medicine.”

Slider said the trip is an intense several days, but it’s well worth it.
“You work yourself to death, you (leave) there and you’re kind of shell-shocked,” Slider said. “You really feel like you’ve helped people.”

All the help comes at a cost. The entire trip costs $50,000 or more, Slider said. He said he encourages people to donate to the Crystal Foundation.
Companies like Alcon Laboratories donate large amounts toward the medical trips, Morales said.

The reward of the trip is in seeing lives changed, he said.

“You can’t measure it,” Slider said. “You just really feel like you’re helping a lot of people that otherwise wouldn’t get help.”

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Mission to Mexico

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