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| First Medicines Outreach |
| India: Tsunami Relief |
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| Outreach Team: Vijay, Basker, Timothy, Mitta, & Dhamodharan |
| Srinivasapurum Beach with destroyed home of Vijay and his Family Canopy is site of First Medicines Beach Clinic |
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| On December 26, 2004 the Asian tsunami that ravaged many countries surrounding the Indian Ocean seriously affected South India. Over ten thousand lives were lost and multitudes of coastal villages were decimated by the waves. In early February a First Medicines outreach team arrived in Chennai, India to provide trauma relief. Over the next twenty-one days, private interventions and clinics were conducted in one local village, Srinivasapurum, and in six other villages along a 200-kilometer coastline. The First Medicines Team, composed of Director Timothy L. Trujillo and Member Services Director Mitta Wise, worked in partnership with Indian Liaison Naraynanan Dhamodharan and a team he assembled to facilitate access to those in need. Many individuals suffering from grief, headache, sleeplessness, reduced appetite, and diffused body ache, a tsunami trauma syndrome, received complete and enduring relief from their symptoms through our simple, caring interventions. These interventions included a combined therapy of hand and foot massage by one practitioner as the other gave hands-on treatment to head, neck, and shoulders. During this treatment Dhamodharan translated directions for hypnotic relaxation and visualization of comfort, strength, and recovery. Team members and villagers were also trained in the method in order to provide continued relief for their neighbors after our visit. One village, Muttukadu, had been completely displaced by the destruction and relocated to a tent camp three kilometers inland. When arriving in the village the team was taken to a three-year-old girl named Monica who, after the tsunami, had experienced paralysis to one side of the face. She was given hands-on treatment to her face. She and her parents were then instructed in the technique to continue treatment at home. On our third visit two weeks later she confidently displayed her progress through this treatment and the electro- stimulation therapy at hospital by gently closing the previously paralyzed eyelid. Asked to help provide writing slates for the preschool children, we returned with slates and toys and were gifted with songs and artwork drawn to express the tsunami fear. continue... |