Friday, September 17, 2010

Meet the Volunteers in Nicaragua and Panama

A new team of Project HOPE volunteers joined Continuing Promise 2010 aboard the USS Iwo Jima and ashore to offer their medical expertise in Nicaragua and Panama during their one-month service.

Jillian Blashka, a pediatric nurse from Alexandria, Virginia, is serving on her first volunteer mission for Project HOPE.




Anne Borden, a nurse from Kittery Point, Maine, brings 26 years of experience in surgical trauma and cardiology to her second volunteer mission with Project HOPE. Earlier this year, she volunteered in Haiti. She is serving as HOPE’s Operations Officer and Chief Nursing Officer onboard the USS Iwo Jima and ashore in Nicaragua and Panama.

Dr. Mary Burry, a physician from Portland, Oregon, is on her first volunteer mission with Project HOPE, but she brings extensive international health experience to her volunteer position. Dr. Burry has worked with disaster relief teams in Somalia, Albania, Turkey, Mozambique, Ethiopia, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Papua New Guinea, Honduras, Pakistan, Zimbabwe and Iraq.

Carma Erickson-Hurt, a nurse from Island Park, Idaho, retired from the United States Navy in 2007. She specializes in palliative care. Carma first worked with Project HOPE when stationed on board the USNS Comfort in response to the tsunami in 2005. Most recently Carma volunteered with Project HOPE as the Chief Nursing Officer for disaster relief medical care aboard the USNS Comfort hospital ship in response to the earthquake in Haiti. She is serving as the HOPE Medical Director onboard the USS Iwo Jima and ashore in Nicaragua and Panama.

Dr. John Hoggard, a family medicine physician from Portland, Oregon, is on his first volunteer assignment with Project HOPE. His international health experience includes many missions caring for refugees of drought, war, floods, tsunami and earthquakes.

Bonnie Hudlet, a photographer from Hayden, Idaho, is a first-time volunteer for Project HOPE. She brings a wealth of photojournalism experience from South America and Argentina to her position as HOPE's Public Affairs Officer onboard the USS Iwo Jima and ashore in Nicaragua and Panama.

Dr. Robert Alan Jamison, a retired pediatrician from Morristown, Tennessee, just recently returned from a HOPE volunteer mission in Indonesia. He's again using his pediatric expertise onboard the USS Iwo Jima and ashore in Nicaragua and Panama.

Dr. Victoria McEvoy, a pediatrician from Cambridge, Massachusetts, is serving on her first volunteer mission with HOPE onboard the USS Iwo Jima and ashore in Nicaragua and Panama.


Dr. Earl Wellington, a retired physician from Harlingen, Texas is serving on his first mission for Project HOPE. Onboard the USS Iwo Jima and ashore in Nicaragua and Panama, Dr. Wellington is volunteering as an Internal Medicine physician.

One more rotation of HOPE volunteers will serve Continuing Promise 2010 alongside their Navy counterparts as the ship continues its eight country humanitarian assistance and health education mission through Colombia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Guyana, Haiti, Nicaragua, Panama and Suriname.

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