The second of two teams of WELS volunteer medical professionals left for the Dominican Republic Mar. 15 to join efforts to treat victims of January's earthquake in Haiti who have crossed the border seeking medical care. The second team, consisting of two nurses and two translators, will be relieving a team that's been in the Dominican Republic since Mar. 10. The second team will stay through Mar. 23.

The teams are given a variety of assignments by the International Medical Alliance of Tennessee, a non-profit organization that provides access to medical care in under-served and vulnerable communities around the world. The volunteers are based at a hospital in the border town of Jimaní. From there, they've been assigned to treat patients at an orphanage and tent city about 10 miles away. They've also been called in to assess the medical needs of Haitian refugees who have moved into slums in the Dominican countryside.

"Words cannot adequately express what we saw and experienced when we got there," says Mark Vance, director of operations for WELS Committee on Relief, speaking of the slum neighborhoods. "I was warned that the conditions were bad, but I have never seen anything like this before. It was the bush country of Africa right here in the Dominican Republic: stick houses with thatch roofs, children running everywhere with little to no clothing on their malnourished bodies, no electricity, running water, or plumbing."

Compounding the poverty, says Vance, is the heat. Many of the volunteers in the first team were close to exhaustion by noon of their first day.

Despite the challenges, Vance says the volunteers remain upbeat and enthusiastic. "We rejoice in both the sufferings—and the comfort overflowing from our Lord," Vance says. He says he and the other volunteers relish "the opportunity to share the physical and spiritual comfort and compassion of God's Holy Word with these wonderful people."