Helen was five years old when she made the trip from her homeland to the United States of America with her mother, sister, and brother. Helen grew up hearing many terrible stories about people who were injured in the war. So as a child, Helen was eager to become a nurse to help those people. And indeed, she became one.
In early 1991, her operating room manager at the University of Virginia said, "Helen, I'd like you to take on a small project." "Okay," Helen agreed. "What's up?" Her manager replied, "Our nineteen operating rooms here are generating too much medical waste. Clean stuff that haven't been used. With your twenty years, working in the operating room, you have the knowledge and experience to figure out what to do with them all. "
So for a year, Helen collected clean medical supplies from all their operating rooms and donated them to missions (布道所). She researched the issue of medical waste. She was surprised to find that more than 2. 4 million tons of hospital waste is generated in the USA annually, with the operating rooms being the largest waste generators. "This is valuable waste, which can beutilizedagain rather than just being thrown away," she said.
Helen worked four ten-hour days in the operating room, and then spent countless hours networking with people on behalf of missions. Before she could say, "How did I get myself into this?" She had formed Medical Equipment Recovery of Clean Inventory (物品清单)(MERCI). For years, she sorted supplies after work, every day including weekends. Gradually MERCI had a steady stream of volunteers helping to sort, and the results were beyond their wildest imaginations. Since Helen started her "small project", MERCI has sorted more than 350 tons of medical supplies valued at ＄75 million, which have been sent all over the world and helped many people.
And now, Helen still leads a very busy life, but she thinks what she has been doing is meaningful.
