Health and Wholeness

Many chronic illnesses from which people suffer today are related to issues of life-style, behavior, broken relationships, or inner problems of anxiety, guilt, fear, painful feelings, or poorly handled stress. The modern bio-medical approach to illness focuses primarily on the physical dimension of illness and seeks to cure or control the physical disease. Biomedicine largely ignores the psycho-social and spiritual dimensions of the sick person and the illness, yet these dimensions play important roles in health, in the disease, and in the therapeutic process. Project MedSend is committed to preparing our grant recipients to meet the spiritual, emotional, social and relational needs of the individuals God puts in their path.

We take the view that good health includes: Adequate Food, Shelter; Joy in living; Peace with the God of the universe; Rest; Leisure; Cleanliness; Health education; Access to curative care; Emotional stability; Self-esteem; Dignity; The ability to earn a living. All leading to experiencing the abundant life (John 10:10).

Project MedSend grant recipient in Kenya promotes health by distributing mosquito netting treated with insecticide.

All Project MedSend recipients are enrolled in two courses:

1) A Team Approach to Caring for the Whole Person
This is a DVD-based distance learning course consisting of
1. 22 one-hour video presentations in a DVD format
2. A textbook: God, Medicine, and Miracles by Dan Fountain, M.D.
3. A workbook, 125 pages, entitled Helping Hurting People
4. E-mail interaction with the two facilitators

Facilitators
Dan Fountain, M.D., MPH, Director, Global Health Training Program, King College
Sherry O’Donnell, D.O., Internist in private practice in St. Joseph Michigan

 
2)HACC - Health, Agriculture, Culture and Community workshop

Motivating people to make behavioral changes is difficult because the roots of behavior are in culturally determined beliefs and values. The arena for promoting behavioral changes is in dialog about the cultural values and beliefs that underlie behavior. An understanding of cultural anthropology and the practice of cross-cultural communication is essential for successful motivation of changes in community development, and behavior related to health, nutrition, and agriculture.

The biblical view of reality provides fundamental principles of health and healthy behavior and gives core cultural values important for community development. The Global Health Training Program at King College in Bristol TN in association with ECHO, offers a five-day workshop to train health and community development professionals on how to help people improve their own health and nutrition. The workshop brings together biblical principles of health and agriculture, cross-cultural methods of communication, and skills in establishing relationships that facilitate behavioral changes for the improvement of health and nutrition. It is excellent preparation for an inter-cultural ministry of transformational development.




Project MedSend grant recipient in Cambodia teaching principles of community health.