AfricanKelli

I found myself in a meeting yesterday debating the care and treatment of HIV patients in Africa. It isn’t every day this happens, and it was a meaningful afternoon. Surrounded by a handful of colleagues, we swapped the latest research findings (circumcision reduces HIV transmission, bats are the natural resevoir of Ebola, etc.) and talked about the effectiveness of our programming.

Part of my job is training volunteers in rural Africa to care for their friends and family who are dying of AIDS. This puts the volunteers at risk. There is wound care and maintenance involved, among other things. AIDS is a messy disease and the death is typically not peaceful. These volunteers are gentle, compassionate souls for caring for their neighbors and friends. It is something I wonder if I could do myself, to be quite honest. I’ve used to ditch my girl scout troop when we’d have to go to the retirement home. I simply don’t deal with death and dying well.

One of the many problems we are facing is that our volunteers are not immune to the living and health conditions in their communities. They are dying too. We are struggling to keep our teams trained. It is a frustrating cycle. How do you teach a group of adults how to communicate with their friends when you couldn’t be more culturally and linguistically different? How do you get them to lead by example? I hope to return to Mozambique this summer to find out. I’d like to spend a month working on volunteer trainings, developing teaching materials that can be used for illiterate teachers and illiterate students. I’d like to see if I can make even the smallest of dents in this giant problem.

The bigger, more depressing elephant in the room during this debate, is how do you inspire someone to change their health behaviors? I can understand why they wouldn’t want to fight to live to 50 when 33 is so miserable. This isn’t all of Africa, or even all of Mozambique. Our programs target families that live on less than US$1 per day. They struggle with hunger and disease every day.

Changing health behaviors isn’t easy in any culture or any economic class. I find it amusing the advertising machines crank out the resolution commercials by the millions this time of year, suggesting that if you just buy this product your life will be better instantly. Often making the healthy choice is the more difficult choice — whether it is demanding condom use, remembering to put on sunscreen every day, or taking the time to cut up vegetables for a salad. It takes me about twice the amount of time to lose weight as it does to gain it back, for example. And God knows it is easier to hit the snooze than bundle up and head out to the gym pre-dawn.

Returning to Africa isn’t in my company’s travel budget this year. I’ve got my fingers crossed for an unexpected windfall. And while I’m wishing, I suppose the ability to effectively teach and the motivation to make my own healthy choices would be great too.

Easiest ways to improve your health: wear your seat belt,~ wear sunscreen ~ drink lots of water ~ don’t smoke ~ eat spinach ~ laugh often ~ love freely ~ walk!

I made it home safe and sound from Philly, although it make take a few months for my skin to recover. Good Lord I do not understand why people choose to live in that kind of cold. Brr!

Yesterday I presented a paper on Mozambique and some research I helped conduct last year. The abstract was selected for a “poster” presentation. Considering I am not apt to follow directions (see my recipe and knitting sections for regular examples), I was rather proud of myself for following the organization’s suggestions for information to include on your poster. I did just that, and apparently was the only person at the entire conference to not know what to expect.

I present my poster:

I picked this fabric up this summer during my travels and thought it would add some flare.

If nothing else, it would give people an idea of where Mozambique is and provide a colorful conversation piece. Right?

I present the common/typical/expected poster presentation:

Wow is that boring. Wow did I not know what I was getting myself into. Look at the crest, and flags and diagrams.

My presentation was Liberace in a room full of Clay Aikens.

If I can achieve one thing in this field, it is to introduce a little color to the mundane. I mean really, doesn’t this room scream for color? The Fab 5? Something? At least paleontology has TRex. What does public health have? Ebola? There is just no humor in ebola.

Here’s the fun part. I didn’t know there was a competition for the best poster presentation. I heard a rumor that I may be a contender. Take that gray. Take that fancy laminated sheets and government seals. A $2 piece of fabric and a handful of thumb tacks just crept up behind you and beat you silly.

~~~

We will now return to the previously scheduled holiday freak out session already in progress. Wrap, pack, label, stamp. Repeat.

And no talking about work on your personal blog.

The two rules of life, right?

Well, I am about to break one, and needless to say, I’m not holding a bat or wiping away tears.

I love my job, and therefore cannot be terribly specific here. However, I can say I am part of a social movement to improve the health of women and children in need.

This article is fueling my career-based entry. Fistulas are tears that can occur in the bladder or intestinal wall when a woman is giving birth. Usually these happen after hours and hours of intense labor with the baby’s head stuck in the birth canal. Fistulas have been a thing of the past in developed nations for more than 100 years; so few women here go without prenatal care and deliver by themselves at home. Does anything sound more terrifying? I cannot imagine.

Now make these soon-to-be mothers 12-19 years old. They are young, African, poor, uneducated and unprepared for the baby struggling to leave their tiny childlike frames. When fistulas occur, the baby usually dies and the mother is left with a gaping hole that keeps her incontinent. In
Mozambique, there are 3 surgeons that can perform the necessary surgery to correct these tears. There are 17 million people in this southeast African nation.

And chances are, if they couldn’t find the resources to seek prenatal care, they will not be able to pay the $300 required for the fistula repair.

This is a cultural phenomenon in sub-Saharan Africa. These women live on the fray of society — pushed away from the central markets, kicked out of their homes, abandoned by their husbands. They cannot help but always smell of urine and cannot work under such circumstances. They are the women who sit in clumps at the airport, begging foreigners for any assistance possible. They struggle to find enough food to eat and are prey to violence. If Africa adhered to the caste system, they would be the untouchables.

If you have a few minutes to read this article and look at the photos today, I encourage you to do so. I am thankful that the organization I work for has programming in Mozambique to keep these girls in school, train midwives to be present to prevent such traumatic deliveries, and provide somewhat of a cushion for those who need healthcare services.

These are a few mothers I’ve met in my travels.

As they say in Cameroon, “small small catch monkey.” One day at a time.

~AK

I’ve been watching CNN and Fox News for the last few hours without reprieve. Funny thing about staying in a hotel with cable — even though I think it is MTV and TLC that I miss without having cable at home, in times like these, it is network news.

I just watched the Secretary of Health and Human Services talk about how they are sending in teams of public health officials to help with the Katrina crisis in
Louisiana and Mississippi. I scratched my head as he rambled off a list of infectious disease they are hoping to prevent.

I am a public health official. Well, worker anyway. And granted, I’m at the beginning of this career, but I can’t think what my skill set would do to improve what is happening on the Gulf coast. I could cook, mend socks and take temperatures, but I can’t restore peace. I can’t explain why there are still thousands waiting for additional buses to get out of town. I couldn’t apply the majority of the community health lessons I learned because “emergency” is so rarely a part of the American public health scene. They need fresh water, functioning sewage systems, regular meals and drug maintenance for those on prescription regimens.

They need infrastructure. The need money.

I’m not sure how to feel about the criticisms that our government would have reacted sooner to this mess if the population hurt were predominantly white, versus the African Americans on the news. Or if the population were wealthy instead one of the poorest sections of the nation. I cannot believe the reports of people left in these cities who are shooting at rescuers and taking every opportunity to cause havoc. There are a small handful of bad people making this process even harder than it already is, and making the nation shake its head in disbelief. Instead, we should focus on the hundreds of thousands who managed to escape and help their neighbors get out too.

We know the poor are more prone to disease; I wasn’t surprised to hear a doctor on scene say they are in desperate need for insulin. Not antibiotics, but insulin. They are in chronic disease emergency maintenance.
I wish there was something more that I could do, other than donate money and pray for an engineering solution to this mess and future storms. I suggest a pipeline from the gulf to Texas, New Mexico and Arizona. If they can pipe oil for thousands of miles (and they do, see Alaska and Cameroon for examples), they can pipe water that could be used to feed our growing demand for agriculture, golf courses and lakes in the middle of the desert.

I am praying for those influenced by this monster storm and hoping for a peaceful return for residents. These great people could use your help too.

~K

I’m having a bit of a problem with my new digital camera. I don’t know all of the settings yet and I’ve obviously selected the “blurry” option for many of my
Nicaragua photos. Nonetheless, they are now downloaded and available for viewing here.

The trip went something like this: arrive in Nicaragua, take a yellow school bus three hours north to Jinotega, go out for drinks with staff, take some photos of flowers around the hotel, go to the baptism, go to the hospital and hang out with new moms, go to a community health meeting, have one of the ladies in this community make me lunch, come home.

Brief, but to the point.

One of the most fulfilling aspects of this trip was returning to the community hospital and visiting the maternity ward. By ward, I mean overstuffed room. There were a dozen women who’d had a baby in the last day resting in the room. Some were hooked up to IVs and some were waiting for a pole to become available so they could get medication. I’d found several packages of onesies at Wal-Mart on clearance before the trip. I scooped them up and happily handed each mom a new piece of clothing. They also posed with their babies while I took Polaroids. They were thrilled to watch their photo develop before their very eyes. I get such pleasure in moments like these. It is a simple joy to give someone a photo, or a $2 piece of clothing, but it made them feel special. I loved it.

A couple of the moms were indigenous women who’d hiked into the hospital after delivering at home. Home births are not uncommon, but seeing indigenous people in the hospital is. They were from such outlying areas, they didn’t speak Spanish. However, our midwives have provided enough information to their communities that they knew they needed to take their little ones into the hospital when signs of danger presented. Public health at work. Yay!

Also, you’ll see knitted items above newborns in incubators in several of the photos. When I returned from Mozambique, there was another small package of African Knit items that had arrived. These were distributed to premies at the hospital. Their mothers were very thankful. So am I.

Cheers,

Kelli

I heard yesterday I was selected to present at the national public health conference in New Orleans this November. I created a study and led a research project in Mozambique on maternal and child health needs in regards to HIV, cholera and malaria. I’ll present a poster on this topic. I also led a survey of undocumented immigrant families in Phoenix and their immediate health needs and attitudes toward accessing the local health system. I’ll give a brief presentation on these findings.

It is exciting that my first time submitting research, it was chosen to be shared with colleagues. But is it wrong I’m almost just as excited to finally visit N’Orlins? WOO HOO!

Nothing says professional conference like bourbon and beads.

~AfricanKelli

If you are wondering about the recent flourish of photo activity, I just got another crop of film back from the developer. Here are a few of my favorite shots from this weekend:

Victor Abel. I become his official godmother July 29th.

Colleagues and friends from ASU who came along on the trip.

I’ve aptly titled this one, “Me with Kid.” I lost those sunglasses yesterday. I am so bummed.

~AfricanKelli

Preliminary photos are back from the Nicaraguan Adventure.

On Saturday we took a hike through the jungle,

into a coffee grove,

Where I was this close <———————————-> to being bitten by this evil one.

EEEK! King snake? Or Coral snake? Either way, I took off running.

Update: I did not take these photos. It has been pointed out that perhaps my phobia of snakes is waining if I had enough time to snap a few shots. Alas, I was about a mile away already when this was taken. Thankfully a coworker had her camera and courage nearby.

~AfricanKelli

It is nearing midnight in Managua and I am struggling with a foreign keyboard. This trip has been incredible. Today we visited nine families that have received new houses in from our housing program. They live in complete and total poverty and were falling over themselves to thank us for the mud walls and tin roof our funding provided. Humility and perspective have been gained.

The families cooked us lunch, but there were not enough chairs for them to eat with us. Instead, they stood around in the shade of mango and avocado trees and watched as we inhaled the chicken broth and potato soup. The food was so good and we´d been hiking for about an hour to reach their village. We were incredibly embarrassed to look up and see dozens of eyes staring at our feast. Once we were finished, they ate their own servings, making sure we were happy first. Nicaraguans are gentle, kind people with generous hearts. I´ve never felt safer outside of the U.S.

This keyboard is driving me crazy, but I wanted to quickly check in. We´re headed home tomorrow and I am looking forard to a new razor and hot bath. I got stung by a bee on the face today and then hit my head on a wood pole. I´ve got a swollen cheek and an egg on my forehead. Lovely. But it has been a great trip and I´m looking forward to my next adventure to Nicaragua.

More later when I can gather my thoughts,

Africankelli

Here’s a pic from my last trip to Jinotega. I am the owner of the giant white forehead in the background. Hopefully I’ll get to run into a few of these sweet kids again.