GREENSBORO, N.C. -- National Nurses Week kicked off with Nurses Day on Sunday. It’s a reminder of the important role nurses play in our communities.
- National Nurses Week underway
- Three nurses from Greensboro took medical mission trip to Guatemala
- The women invite anyone interested in going on the trip, not just nurses, to join
Michelle Evangelista, Becky Cummings and Amy Korslien are all nurses who usually work at hospitals in Greensboro, but a few weeks ago they took their mission of helping people in need all the way to Guatemala.
For these nurses, it started with Becky Cummings, who connected with Raleigh-based nonprofit Curamericas Global, through her church Christ Methodist United in Greensboro. It’s the same church Curameria’s founder attended growing up.
For over 25 years the church has supported Curamerica’s work of helping people in impoverished areas of the world get health care.
The women left for the mission trip on March 30 and came back April 10. Now back home, they can’t wait to go back on another medical mission trip next year.
A nurse at Kernersville Medical Center, Michelle Evangelista said, "I feel happy to be home, but very sad because I miss the people. I love cultures and learning about people and their lives, and I always feel like they always give me more than I can give them. When I come back I just miss it, and I miss the field a lot."
During their missions, the volunteers stay in "Casa Maternas," clinics Curamericas founded and staffs around the clock.
Becky Cummings, a nurse at Moses Cone Memorial Hospital, said, "We give a lot of education, even simple education -- teaching children to wash their hands, for example. Or they asked us to teach the staff."
For Cummings’ friend Amy Korslien, this would be her first medical mission trip.
"One of the reasons they like having us come is because they need help,” said Korslien. “When they know we’re coming, a lot of people from the outside communities will come in because they know there's extra help at the Casa Maternas.”
As a first-timer, the trip had a different impact on Korslien.
"I think just seeing their homes and living conditions was probably the biggest culture shock for me because it's just such a different way of living than it is here. But you know, for me it was just really interesting to see how even though they don't have much how self-sufficient and how capable they are of living on what they have."
Their first night there, a local woman went into labor and they helped deliver her baby. That part of their trip would come full circle before they returned home.
"The last day we were there, we did home visits, and the last house we went to happened to be the mother of the child that was delivered,” said Evangelista. “So we got to see the baby and hold her and love on her."
The nurses say they’re always looking for people to go with them on medical mission trips. You don’t have to be a registered nurse to go, they train anyone who wants to be a part of the mission for what they may face during the trip.