Four members of the Moses Lake Medical Team (MLMT) traveled to Santiago, Chile from September 3, through September 10, 2019. This trip was designed to serve two purposes. The first reason for this visit was to show appreciation to our Chilean counterparts who have been traveling to Africa with us for about three years to provide free medical services to the needy patients in Kebbi State, Nigeria. To appreciate their selfless efforts and commitment, the MLMT thought it was necessary to visit the providers from Chile. The other reason for the visit was to highlight the efforts of our Chilean participants to the Health Care Authority in Chile. We want to make sure that the healthcare decision-making body in Chile is aware of the contribution of the team to the healthcare delivery efforts in Kebbi State, Nigeria.

To achieve our objectives, both the President and the Medical Director of MLMT (Lateef Olaniyan and Michael Johnson) delivered PowerPoint presentations. The presentations were well received, and there were lots of discussion as well as questions and answers. The first presentation was to the directors of the hospital where most of our providers work, followed by a presentation to the Ministry of Health. Both the hospital directors and the Deputy Director to the Minister of Health, who is in charge of Public Health in the country of Chile, were very impressed with the presentations. The Deputy Minister assured us that the Ministry of Health would always support our initiatives by granting the providers from Chile permission to continue to help the citizens of Kebbi with their healthcare needs.

A representative of the Kebbi State Government was planning to accompany the team to Chile to convey an appreciation message from Governor Abubakar Atiku Bagudu to the people of Chile. However, due to schedule conflict, the representative did not make the trip. Members of MLMT that travelled to Chile delivered the Governor’s message to the Deputy Health Minister, who also sent his greetings to the Kebbi State Governor.    

We would like to thank our team members from Chile for hosting us during this visit. We would also like to extend our appreciation to the hospital administrators for listening to our presentation. We are also very thankful to the Chilean Ministry of Health for meeting with us and for granting our providers from Chile the permission to continue to travel with the team to help the less privileged patients with their healthcare delivery needs. The visit was very fruitful. Thanks also to that went.

Lateef Olaniyan, RPh, PharmD

President, Moses Lake Medical Team