Phyllis is Injured.
Lisfranc Injury

On August 15, walking out from the Nong Khai Train Station, I, Phyllis, fell and twisted my right ankle. Because I was carrying some heavy bags at the time, my left foot also twisted and I badly hurt and dislocated some of the bones in the mid foot. This is called a lisfranc dislocation.

From Nong Khai, we drove to Udon Thani and I checked into emergency at the best hospital in town. The orthopedic specialist asked me some questions but the one that startled me the most was “Was your foot previously deformed?”

X-rays and other tests followed. The operating room was reserved to allow the team to manipulate my bones back into their correct positions. More x-rays followed. The next day the doctor said that it hadn’t worked to manually move the bones. Surgery with pins would be necessary. Then I took an ambulance to have an MRI in Khon Kean -- about an hour away. This was a very uncomfortable ride – bumpy, fast and full of swerves -- and there are no seat belts for patients in the back. I hope I never have to travel in an ambulance again.

With the pictures from the MRI as a guide, the doctors were able to put in 5 pins to hold the bones in place while the ligaments and muscles heal. They will stay in my foot for 2 months. Right now they stick out about 2 mm. (I'm trying not to think about how they'll take them out!)

I’m now wearing a splint and tensor bandage so that I can change the bandages daily. I’ll get a hard cast soon but expect to be on crutches for the next few months. One problem with the crutches is that my "good" foot is swollen ankle and sore from the fall; I'm finding it easier to go up and down stairs on my bum.

Here are some links to more information about this kind of injury if you are interested:

http://www.emedicine.com/orthoped/topic511.htm
http://orthoinfo.aaos.org/fact/thr_report.cfm?Thread_ID=315&topcategory=Foot
http://orthopedics.about.com/cs/footproblems/a/lisfranc.htm

We were just on our way back home after an extended period away when the accident happened. We had been on a retreat in Vietnam, a family holiday in Sri Lanka, and had attended a meeting in Bangkok. This was the last stage of our trip and the fall happened about 1 km from the Lao border.

I finally made it home on August 19.

So that's why we haven't posted anything lately.

Sri Lanka

Now we are in Sri Lanka. We are staying in Galle with our friends who live inside Galle Fort.



Here are the boys: David, Sam, Erik, James and Conrad

Our first lunch in Sri Lanka was at McDonald's but we did not order the McRice! We were more conservative than that.


We'll post more pictures later.

Vietnam Retreat

MCC staff, their families and some of the foreign volunteers drove to Vietnam for a retreat. We drove from Vientiane to Vinh the first day. Vinh is a Vietnamese city on the Gulf of Tonkin. The next day we drove north to Halong Bay.


Vietnam seems much more developed than Laos.

The next day, we took a 5-hour cruise around Halong Bay. The trip included lunch and the steward also brought out souvenirs for us to go through along the way.


That afternoon we drove to Hanoi and stayed in a hotel that was in 3 different buildings on the same block and each building was only one room wide. In fact, there were a lot of one-room-wide houses in Vietnam. Here is one of the more bizarre examples.


Our time in Hanoi was spent sight-seeing and shopping. We went to the Ho Chi Minh museum.

We also visited the MCC office. This photo is of our group walking down one of the lanes leading to the MCC office.