Medical Mission Trip with One World Surgery

This past February two Crystal Run Healthcare Physicians, Dr. Jocelyn Dummett and Dr. Lernice Henry, teamed up with new Optum colleagues to attend a week-long medical mission trip with One World Surgery to the Dominican Republic. We interviewed them about their experience.

Crystal Run Healthcare (CRHC): Where did you go and what made you attend this experience with One World Surgery?

Dr. Dummett: We had just integrated into Optum when Dr. Nasser sent out an email with an opportunity for us to go on a medical mission trip to the Dominican Republic. Dr. Henry and I have always wanted to do this type of experience together, so we applied immediately when we got the email. We learned that Optum allots providers 40 hours of volunteer work a year which can also go toward continuing medical education (CME) credits.

CRHC: What was something you did not expect while volunteering?

Dr. Henry: You had to bring everything with you to the medical sites, and we went to a different site every day. When you go, you are the clinic. We brought anything a patient might need. We brought tables, chairs, privacy screens, and huge trunks of medications, prescription cards, and eyeglasses.

CRHC: That’s a lot of supplies! How did you sort them all?

Dr. Dummett: Sunday was our preparation day. All of the volunteers, medical and nonmedical, went to a facility filled with what we might need for the week. We needed to count out medication, sort medical supplies, everything. We were clinic, pharmacy, optometry, any type of medical care that the patients might need us to be, we prepared for. 

Dr. Henry: Among the volunteers were also teens and young adults who came with their parents. You’d think they’d just want to have fun in the Dominican Republic but they took volunteering so seriously from day one. They treated patients with dignity, were respectful, and did their jobs so well. They didn’t complain. They asked for extra work. They really were amazing children.

CRHC: Who else volunteered with you?

Dr. Henry: In total there were six pediatricians and four internists. The volunteers were fellow Optum employees and physicians from Long Island and Queens, NY. Plus, our roommate Pia from California!

Dr. Dummett: We also worked with the One World Surgery staff, volunteer interpreters, and local med students. 

CRHC: Can you describe what your average volunteer day was like?

Dr. Dummett: Every day we went to a different site – called batays – which were shanty towns of makeshift homes. They had no running water, electricity, or indoor plumbing. Most of our patients lived there – they came to the DR to work in the sugarcane fields and built homes out of whatever they could find. We worked two doctors to a table and worked until we saw the last patient. We would see anywhere from 100-150 patients a day.

Dr. Henry: At every batay, the dynamics and types of medical issues changed every day. One day we would see a lot of virus, the next skin infections. We learned that we could guess what we would see each day because once we saw that first patient almost everyone that followed had the same symptoms. 

CRHC: What was the most common medical issue you treated while volunteering?

Dr. Dummett: We saw a lot of skin infections and anemia. Cases for Rickets in children, which we never see here, and just diseases you expect to see with poverty. Lots of worms and parasites. Thankfully we had the medication. If we ran out, One World Surgery doctors would go to patients' homes and deliver it to those who still needed medication afterwards. 

CRHC: How did you feel by the end of your volunteer week?

Dr. Dummett: The depth of poverty we saw is indescribable. It was a weird feeling; on one hand, you felt like you did good work but on the other, it felt like it wasn’t enough. I was glad I went but I also wished at the end of the week that I could stay and give them everything I had.  

Dr. Henry: At first I felt like I did not do enough, but one of the staff from OWS told me something that made me feel like it was worth it. She said “You did what you’re supposed to do. If everyone does a little bit we will do what we need to do together.” It made me feel like if everyone just dedicated one week of their time it would change the world.

CRHC: Thank you for your volunteer work and for sharing your experience with us!

Dr. Jocelyn A. Dummett is a Board-Certified Pediatrician and Pediatrics Division Lead at Crystal Run Healthcare. She earned her Medical Degree at Howard University College of Medicine in Washington, D.C. Dr. Dummett completed her Internship in Pediatrics at Saint Vincent's Catholic Medical Centers of New York in New York, New York, and her Residency in Pediatrics at SUNY Downstate Medical Center/Kings County Hospital in Brooklyn, New York. Her clinical interests are general pediatrics and pediatric weight management. Dr. Dummett is currently seeing patients in Middletown, NY.

Lernice Henry, DO is a Board-Certified Pediatrician at Crystal Run Healthcare. She earned her Medical Degree from New York College of Osteopathic Medicine in Old Westbury, NY and completed her Residency in Pediatrics at Lincoln Medical and Mental Health Center in Bronx, NY. Her clinical interests include asthma and pediatric weight management. Dr. Henry is seeing patients in Middletown, NY.