Friends and family rally around heart patient returned home

Seang Yean was greeted at her small home in Okroch, Kampong Thom, Tuesday by a crowd of family and church members hoping to witness firsthand the amazing recovery they helped make possible by financing her trip to Phnom Penh for heart surgery.

Yean, a 47-year-old mother of two, was first introduced to CHAD in February, when she was suffering from a serious but still unidentified disease. Several doctor's consultations later, it was revealed that she needed immediate surgery to repair a defective heart valve.

The members of Okroch Methodist Church would hear nothing of Yean's initial hopelessness — how could she pay for such an expensive surgery? — and they immediately started raising money. In a week, this poverty-stricken congregation had scraped together $25.

It wasn't nearly enough to finance a surgery, but church members consulted CHAD, which was able to find free treatment through Phnom Penh's Jeremiah Hope Clinic, and the church's contribution was enough to get Yean and her blood donors to and from the hospital.

Tuesday's reunion with the church family that refused to give up on her was a sweet one, said Yean, whose condition has vastly improved since her March 5 surgery. She is slowly regaining her breath and energy and says she thanks God for giving her the support and courage she needed to make it through.

Read more of Yean's story here. Donate to CHAD's Health Program here.

Heart patient on the mend after surgery

Seang Yean, the heart patient we told you about last month, is in the hospital recovering from what doctors are calling a successful operation on a defective valve in her heart.

CHAD staff member Sok Sophal said Yean was in good spirits — but quite sore — during a visit at Jeremiah Hope Clinic in Phnom Penh last week.

The surgery took place March 5 after several weeks of delay, and Yean has been recuperating at the hospital ever since. The first few days after the operation were a bit rocky, with Yean staying in the emergency portion of the clinic under close observation by hospital staff, but her status was upgraded late last week and doctors expect she will be discharged early next week.

Yean was introduced to CHAD by members of her church in Okroch Village, Kampong Thom, last month after she had been suffering from an unknown but debilitating medical condition for almost a year. It was then, after she was referred to a specialist in Phnom Penh, that Yean discovered it was a heart condition that had been keeping her in bed and out of the rice fields. Moreover, she learned she needed surgery right away.

Although CHAD does not pay for operations, staff were able to connect Yean with organizations that could, and the procedure was performed free of charge.

Read all of Yean's story here.

Donate to CHAD's health program here.

Check out Jeremiah Hope Clinic on Facebook.

Woman gets life-saving heart surgery with help of determined church family and CHAD

Sean Yean, 47, front, poses at UMC's Global Ministries office in Phnom Penh Wednesday with a team of supporters from her church who are doubling as blood donors for her heart surgery, scheduled for today. They are, from left, Chhean Samoun; her daughter, Leat Sinat; and Heam Sokkhet.
AMANDA KING PHOTO

Seang Yean's story could have been one of despair. She could have taken the diagnosis quietly and gone home to die, like many in her poverty-stricken village in Kampong Thom Province would have.

But Yean had a church family behind her. And they weren't about to let that happen.

When the 47-year-old mother of two was diagnosed with a defective heart valve this month, the doctor gave her two options: Have surgery immediately or die in a matter of weeks.

The diagnosis was devastating. How could Yean, a poor rice farmer who had been out of work sick for the last year, afford such an expensive procedure?

Her church didn't know the answer to that question either. But they started raising money anyway. It wasn't much. After all, most of Yean's fellow church members live harvest-to-harvest, just like her. In a week, they had managed to scrape together $25.

It would be enough to get Yean to and from the hospital along with her three blood donors while paying for meals and lodging during their stay. It was still nowhere near enough to pay for open heart surgery.

Fortunately for Yean, her church had more than just money to contribute. After extensive Mobilizing the Church training sessions in their district, the members of Okroch Methodist Church knew this wasn't the end of the road for Yean, that someone somewhere — a non-profit hospital, a private donor — would be able to help.

That's why they contacted CHAD. Staff member Sok Sophal was able to walk Yean through the process, from her provincial hospital visit to her visit to Phnom Penh to see a specialist. And even though CHAD itself doesn't pay for surgeries, the program was able to connect Yean with someone who did.

Today, Yean is undergoing surgery with a team of volunteer heart doctors at Jeremiah Hope Clinic. The initial outlook is good, doctors say. She could be back home in two weeks, all because her church refused to give up on her.

Want to know more about Yean?
Watch the blog over the next few weeks for updates on her progress.

What is Mobilizing the Church Training?
CHAD's training sessions cover more than just health advocacy. These workshops are all about building up outreach-oriented congregations like the one at Okroch. This means training in evangelism, leadership and empowerment as well.

Donate to CHAD's Health Program here. Donate to Mobilizing the Church Training here.

A testimony from Sophal

So the soldiers, their officer, and the Jewish police arrested Jesus and bound him. ~~ John 18:12
"Commit your cause to the LORD; let him deliver-- let him rescue the one in whom he delights!" ~~ Psalm 22:8

"Many people who thought I died during Pol Pot are just to know I am alive," Mrs. Sophal shared with me about re-connecting with friends in the Battambong region where she traveled to conduct a workshop in leadership development for the CHAD program of the Methodist Mission in Cambodia. She and I are driving to another church visit when she received a call from one of these friends.

"We got separated and they thought I had died like my brother."
Mrs. Sophal's brother was a Christian (the only one in her family, and one of very few in Cambodia) before the Khmer Rouge took over the country. He was captured and executed by the Pol Pot regime. The way she tells the story is thus. "They bound his hands, but only loosely. So, he was able to escape a bit to the forest where he prayed before they killed him."

She continues the story by saying that mental illness is a burden for people in Cambodia, especially women. "Women can't release their burden, they just keep thinking, and this causes mental problem. Many times during Pol Pot, I wanted to kill myself, but I thought about my younger sister, what would happen to her if I died." Today, Mrs. Sophal says she can release her burdens through prayer modeled by her brother and by Jesus. She shares this faith with others in Cambodia, with the hope that they can also find release.

Mrs. Sophal's own conversion happened much later, in response to God answering her prayers for healing the sight of man in her community development project. But, the inspiration of her brother, his faith and his prayers, helped to shape her and her understanding that even in the Garden of Gethsemane, we can cast our burdens upon God and find freedom.

by Katherine Parker
A devotional reflection for Good Friday Year B