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News – April 2005
Dear Friends and Supporters, We are having a very busy time this month, both in Beijing and in Henan. Apart from dealing with our own kids, we are assisting in facilitating surgeries for children-in-need, outside of our home. Rob will accompany Zheng Qi an 18-year-old orphaned boy from Shandong Province to the US for bladder surgery. The Mongolian boy with leukemia, Yan Jian Xin, is doing well, and has only a few more treatments to go. We have also been asked to help a child from Luoyang orphanage with a facial deformity.
Foster Home Shun Yi, BeijingThe babiesWe have had an outbreak of bronchopneumonia which has infected almost every single child and has kept us in our toes. Just before this happened, we received a huge supply of antibiotics and nebulizer solutions from medical friends in Malaysia and the US and that has been a tremendous help. Our one and only nebulizer has been going almost non-stop. This has highlighted the urgent need for more (see below). We are arranging for neurosurgery for 4 new babies with spina bifida. All of them are very young, ranging from a few days old to a few months old. They all have open defects that need to be closed as soon as possible to preserve whatever lower limb function they have. Again, neurosurgeons from UCLA have come to the rescue and they will operate in Shanghai United Family Hospital early next month. We are told that the child from Xinjiang Province, who also required neurosurgery, is too weak and is unlikely to survive the trip. Unfortunately we have had him taken off the list. We have a new baby from Luoyang who needs cardiac surgery but he is too weak at the moment and needs building up before this can be done. We are working on him. Alicia Dang Ji Bei and Saragrace Dang Jian Chao are in Singapore as I write, having heart surgery. We hope that they will soon be home with us by the end of this month and that their adoptive parents will be here soon to pick them up, welcoming them into their families and giving them new life. Eric (Wu Min) was admitted to hospital for reconstruction of the anus but his operation has been delayed. Surgery is being arranged for Dang Guo Kun who has a cleft lip. VolunteersThis month we have Red H and Jo H, a team from the UK, and a group of students from Germany.
Shun Yi Outreach Foster ProgramAll 11 children in our Outreach Program are doing well. Tests have been done on Fu Tian Suo and he has been found to have male chromosomes. Surgery will follow at an appropriate time.
Foster Home Sai Qi Fujian ProvinceWe will buy 4 more walkers for the children there with funds donated by Harvard China Care. Guo Yan Fei has had successful heart surgery also sponsored by Harvard China Care. Rob visits them again at the end of this month and we will be able to report more on the possibility of the planned renovations as well as sending updates top all the child-sponsors.
NHF Special Care Unit, Henan ProvinceSince Jan 1st we have had 25 children through the unit. 8 new ones have been transferred to Beijing for medical care filling up every single bed we have. Sadly, Lucy Ge Lan, with severe brain damage, died on March 31. She was loved till the very end. Lyn G is back volunteering at the Unit.
Our thanks
Our needs
Thank you all for your wonderful support. Robin and Joyce Hill.
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