We received this letter from a patient yesterday. This is the good news
Jan sent this email to our kids yesterday. I thought I would share it with our blog friends.
“We just got this letter today from one of our patients. She told me the other day when she was visiting us with some little children that she wished she could do something for us that would express the gratitude she felt in her heart for the service our clinic provides for the people of Tonga. She was so persistent and vocal about her feelings that I finally told her that if she wanted to write a little note we would quite cherish it and would pass it along to the powers that be so they could hear what patients feel about the care they are given, and that the church considers so important. We treat non-members and members alike as they sit in our chairs and I am so happy that our efforts are appreciated. This note just made our day!
Normally I would not share it, but I thought you would like to see it too.
Our mission is a small sacrifice for us all in our family. We appreciate your support on so many levels. Each one of you is part of the reason we can serve and we want you to know that not a day goes by when we don’t think of that. Without your support we simply could not do it. Thank you all so much for your encouragement and daily efforts in our behalf!”
But, we often have to deal with bad news.
We work really hard to see as many patients as we can, and do as many procedures as we can, to save as many teeth as we can. With our volunteer dentist and his wife, we have stepped it up a notch or two.
The young people who come to the clinic have dreams, just as we all do.
But, sometimes, their dreams are interrupted by a visit to the last chair in our clinic, where Malcom and Heather Coombs, our oral surgeon and nurse, need to remove teeth – on kids as young as three or four years old.
This is a 16 year old Form 6 (12th grader) student, at Liahona High School. She has been at Liahona since Form 4. Somehow, she slipped between the cracks, and had never been seen in the dental clinic. There are over 800 students at Liahona High School, and we have vowed to do everything in our power to see that this tragedy never repeats itself.
Phil and Jan's Adventure in Tonga 