Students and faculty from Belmont University’s College of Pharmacy recently completed a year-long project to create an inventory system at the Moore Pediatric Surgery Center in Guatemala City, Guatemala. The project started last July and included four separate mission trips from the college with a total of 23 students and faculty contributing. The most recent team finished the expansive project to catalog the contents of the surgery center which includes three operating rooms and 21 beds. The inventory system was built from scratch, tested, launched and turned over to the surgery center’s local management during the last visit.
The team was led by Dr. Eric Hobson, professor of pharmacy, who was joined on this most recent trip by his family, including his son enrolling at Belmont this fall. Hobson has directed all four of the teams that have contributed to this project. The students on the most recent team included Candice Beam, Kyla Cunico, Alex Ernst, Meredith Ervin, Chelsey Manire and Kandice Squires, all third-year PharmD students, and Kristen Conrad, a second-year student.
“I had to go back to Guatemala,” said Squires, who has also been part of previous project teams. “I claimed dibs on bringing order to the hospital’s third-floor black hole storage room. And, we did it.”
Allison Bender, executive director of The Shalom Foundation, the Franklin, Tennessee not-for-profit that built the Moore Pediatric Surgery Center, called the Belmont teams’ service to the organization, “a true blessing.”
“Now the Moore Center staff can be more efficient and be better stewards of donated resources. Most important, the inventory system that our Belmont friends have built helps us provide the hundreds of Guatemalan children entrusted to our medical care each year an even safer, better experience,” Bender said. “God’s work requires many skill sets, and The Shalom Foundation knows that Belmont University community is home to varied talents and a commitment to service.”
