Telemedicine in Disaster and Humanitarian Relief

HELP is sending over $300,000 in donated medical supplies and equipment to the Ateneo de Zamboanga University on the island of Mindanao in the southern Philippines. They operate numerous medical clinics throughout the southern isalnds in the Philippines.
These clinics may serve up to 50,000 rurally dispersed residents. They are the only healthcare available to many thousands of people. They have almost no equipment or supplies. At one such clinic I visited during recent need assessments surveys, I witnessed a man who had been brought in following a motorcycle accident. He had a deep wound to the inside of one thigh which penetrated down through muscle tissue. These clinics do not have any form of anesthesia so he just had to be pinned down and stitched up. The main challenges to human health in the area include water-borne illness (acute diarrhea), TB, pneumonia, Malaria, Dengue Fever and sever malnutrition.