As those of you who have any experience with health will know, health is not only about fixing those that are unwell, primary prevention and health promotion is vitally important. As you can imagine in this country of extreme poverty where healthcare isn't free and therefore inaccessible to many, this seems irrelevant and unachievable. However as part of our mission, we try to do a little prevention and promotion. All the children that we see are given a toothbrush and toothpaste. This simple act brings a smile to the children's face and so much excitement and our hope is it delays the inevitable tooth decay as a result of basic diet and lack of this basic necessity.
We had a wonderful opportunity for health promotion today. We visited a special organisation and armed with water bottles, plastic cups, ventolin inhalers and disposable gloves provided education to a very caring bunch of adults. We gave education about asthma, and taught them how to make spacers (devices to deliver the ventolin) out of dry water bottles and plastic cups. One of our team has asthma so we could actually demonstrate the technique (thanks Gab's). In addition we discussed "universal precautions" of using gloves when dealing with bleeding, vomiting and diarrhoea in little ones. The adults lapped up this education and were so thankful. For us, this simple gift of engaging and empowering, added to the many gratifying moments that we are experiencing.
