Course Syllabus

Welcome to the Christian Health Service Corps online pre-field health mission training course for healthcare professionals and their families.

This mission orientation hopes to convey the principles and concepts necessary to help you make the transition to full-time healthcare ministry. We also hope it will provide you with some level of preparation for you and your family as you transition across cultures.

We believe that medical missionaries and their families require different training and support than other kinds of missionaries. We will look at what it means to develop resilience for your family in a way that faces the unique challenges of missionary health workers. A recent story received from our physician after arriving to his field assignment in Africa recounted how he manually ventilated an infant for eight hours before he had to let the child die because there were no ventilators or intensive care capabilities. These kinds of challenges need preparation and the development of planned coping strategies to prevent deeply wounding our spirits in the service of our Lord. As a medical missionary you may see physical suffering, misery and death on scales that you may have never imagined. You will also be less equipped to deal with critically ill patients than you have ever been in your career. In adequate infrastructure, language barriers, concerns about personal and family safety can and will take its toll on even the best prepared missionaries.

Your pre-field orientation will focus in three primary areas: 1) Developing competencies that will allow you and your family to transition across cultures, 2) International Standards for healthcare delivery, 3) development of personal resilience for you and you family.

We hope you will leave this course with an understanding that helps you live and proclaim the gospel of Christ. We also hope it will provide you with a basic overview of the complexities you will face in cross cultural health care missions. The program is meant to be completed one module per week, and each module will require 2 to 6 hours of study.

We will meet the second and fourth Sunday evening of the month online and discuss sections of the assigned readings for the previus two weeks and overview important concepts. There are four required texts for this program, the first is entitled "What Missionaries Ought to Know" and it can be downloaded here. Ought to Know ebook.pdf

The second book is When Helping Hurts Hurts by Brian Fikkert and Steve Corbett.

The third book for this course entitled When Healthcare Hurts: An evidence based guide to best practices in global health initiatives.

The fourth book is Cross-cultural Servanthood by Duane Elmer.

The fifth book for this course entitled "Setting Up Community Health Programmes, A Practical Manual for Use in Developing Countries" by Ted Lankester. If you are working in community based healthcare programs, (community clinic), this book is a must have. http://store.hesperian.org/

Orientation Course Objectives:

1) Describe health/medical mission models that facilitate health development

2) Delineate the international standards for medical and nursing practice in developing countries

3) Review and discuss the ways missions (medical and non-medical) have the potential to harm communities they serve

4) Review the World Health Organization standards for child health in developing communities

5) Review and discuss the relevant global health issues and complexities related to providing care in resource poor communities.

6) Develop strategies to remain emotionally, physical, and spiritually healthy while serving on the mission field.