Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Family Planning and Hand Washing Projects

I spent my last few weeks teaching family planning classes at the Hospital with nurse Harriet as my trusty translator. I had another male nurse translate for one of my classes and after I completed the class the women asked to get a woman translator because they didn't believe a man would translate what I was saying correctly. I had fifty cycle beads a week before I left and within two days of classes we taught and sold all fifty beads! So within a few short weeks we totaled 138 cycle beads sold. It was a great way to end my family planning project!

Saturday was our AIDS Extravaganza! We rented a large complex here in Lugazi and had schools and AIDS support groups perform. I spent a good portion of my time last week learning to do a traditional Ugandan dance, which we performed at the Extravaganza with costumes and all. Don’t worry the amazing moment of ten muzungus doing the African dance was captured on film. I ran a booth on infectious disease prevention using resources that they already have available to them. I created the posters in English, and then had a Ugandan friend translate them into Lugandan. I also ran a booth on family planning. I can’t remember if I explained this new project yet, so I’ll keep it brief. I located an NGO called the Uganda Health Marketing Group in Kampala. They sell a lot of products to private businesses as well as give them away for free in villages within their district. Unfortunately, Lugazi doesn’t fall within their district so we purchased a box of Cycle Beads. Cycle beads are composed of a necklace with different colored beads where women can track their cycles. They can then abstain from unprotected sex during the time of the month that they are most fertile. It’s 95% effective in preventing pregnancy for women with regular cycles of 26 to 32 days. We had a booth at the Extravaganza where we planned to run family planning classes and then sell the cycle beads for one hundred shillings. We didn’t quite get the audience we were expecting. We were hoping for the community to come so I could then teach the women this form of family planning. The main people at the Extravaganza were hundreds of student performers. I had to leave a few hours early for Gulu and I left the family planning classes in Josephine’s (public health nurse) care. She said they sold about twenty after I left. I didn’t quite get the numbers I was hoping, so today I planned with Josephine to come every Monday and Wednesday to the hospital and teach the mothers who come in to the antenatal unit to immunize their children. We will then hit our intended audience as well as teach them the benefits of having time in between pregnancies for their own health, which can be accomplished with cycle beads.

Last week we had our unveiling of our very first hand station in the Lugazi Central Marketplace. We set up a booth in the marketplace, luckily it was near the produce and the not near he hanging raw meat. We first presented the hand washing station to the management and then had them sign a contract saying that the hand washing stations will always be fully stocked with water and soap. I will be checking in on the station throughout the summer and if I find that it is not stocked with water and soap three times then we will have a meeting with the management to discuss their relocation. The management agreed and the station has been well stocked since the grand opening. We then certified 167 market vendors in small groups. I gave a lesson on how germs are spread and then I discussed the importance of hand washing and how if done correctly, it can decrease diarrheal diseases by 42-45%. I then asked them questions to verify they understood the material. When they answered them all correctly we had them line up and wash their hands. As soon as they washed their hands they were presented with a hand washing certificate and a hygiene kit (Thank you again Sister Morton!). It was a wonderful day and many of the vendors have proudly displayed their hand-washing certificate at their stand. We are still waiting for four more hand washing stations to be built and I’m hoping they will be finished by the end of the week and then we can install the remaining four. The picture was taken at the end of one of my lessons and the woman I’m handing the hygiene kit to has just washed her hands in the newly constructed hand washing station.
Our next stop for hand washing stations is the local hospital where we will be installing four.

1 comment:

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