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AU Nursing Instructor, Student to Make House Calls in Honduras
10/9/2009
Nursing instructor Deann Edgers will be traveling to Honduras again this month for a medical mission trip.AURORA, Ill. — An Aurora University nursing instructor and a student will be among medical missionaries aiding poor residents of Honduras from Oct. 17-24.
Deann Edgers of Aurora, MN, MS, RN, FNP and AU RN-to-BSN coordinator; and Tamara Wilfong, an RN-BSN major from Glen Ellyn, will be among 23 volunteers traveling to Tegucigalpa, Honduras, for Medical Brigade, a Christian medical mission group.
For a fourth consecutive year, Edgers will serve as medical coordinator for the team sponsored by Good Shepherd Lutheran Church of Naperville. Team members include doctors, nurse practitioners, RNs, physical therapists, an optometrist and others with various skills.
Edgers and Wilfong will be among team members who will go into the community to provide health care to residents.
Brigade members set up medical, dental and optical stations at a local church to check the health of poor residents of the barrios of Tegucigalpa. Additionally, volunteers provide hygiene instruction for children, perform construction work and tell stories about Jesus.
Edgers and Debbie Masiak of Naperville, RN, AU '07, a nurse at Rush-Copley Medical Center in Aurora, were among 24 volunteers who participated last October.
In addition to providing medical services, Masiak also helped to lay cement floors in homes to help reduce disease due to filth, insects and rodents.
Edgers has made annual October trips to Honduras since 1994 and served as medical coordinator since 2006. In 2007, she accompanied two teams for two weeks.
As medical coordinator, her duties include collecting medical supply donations and organizing transportation of supplies.
On site, she directs the medical team and makes sure team members have current immunizations and stay healthy while in country. Part of a five-member leadership team, Edgers also assists with other leadership duties as necessary.
She began her service when Good Shepherd's pastor asked her to fill in for a medical coordinator who had been injured in an accident. "I had just returned from a mission trip in Africa," Edgers said, "and had my passport and immunizations up to date.
"The team needed one more medical person to prevent the trip from being canceled. I went, and have gone every year since."
According to Edgers, AU's administration supports her involvement in the local and global communities. "My mission work is a way that I can reflect that mission of the university. AU also supports me by allowing me to maintain my clinical skills by working in the community both on a mission field and in other areas.
"As a clinical faculty member, I maintain my skills by practicing in the field and then bring that experience back to my role as an professor in the School of Nursing."
Edgers says she uses her Honduras experience in teaching at AU. She instructs a transcultural nursing course and a class in ethics, and health assessment. "All have a strong clinical focus, which lets me use my field experience in the classroom," she said.
"Community service and global awareness are parts of our professional responsibility," Edgers said.
She added that other AU faculty, staff and students do similar work by supporting Hesed House homeless shelter in Aurora and the Dunham School of Business' Volunteer Income Tax Assistance program.
