It Is Everything

While Dr. Martha Lozano had always been interested in medical missions, she had been too busy with her private practice in pediatrics in Houston to participate in one. Then she was introduced to CHRISTUS Operation San José by a family friend who was a nurse on the trip. “She commented they were looking for another pediatrician and would I be interested,” said Lozano.

Lozano interviewed with Dr. Ernest Cronin, one of the program co-founders, and he told her about how his uncle started the program. “He showed me pictures of the places and people they had helped.  It was just an incredible story.”

The 2015 trip to Chihuahua was her first, and she has participated in every trip since. “It’s an incredible feeling you get,” said Lozano. “We put in the long hours, but I’m not even tired when I get back home. To know that you are helping all of these kids that otherwise would not have been helped.”

One story stands out for Lozano. “There was a little five-month-old girl, and she had this cute hair that stood up all around her head. She had a terrible cleft lip. When I looked at her the first time, her parents were very quiet and stoic. She came out of the OR into the recovery room, and by time she woke up she was smiling. The nurse brought in her dad, and I asked him ‘What do you think? How did we do?’ He had the biggest tears in eyes. That’s how much of a difference it makes. To these parents, it was everything.”