Health Screening for 12 villages in Rural Nigeria

African community health Initiative is planning our annual outreach for November 2016.  Over the years ACHI have focused on chronic disease management in rural areas of Nigeria where there is no access or limited access to health care. Our goal of educating people with chronic and endemic health condition on the disease process and how to self-manage their conditions, has really improved the lives of those individuals. We are seeing people with good glucose control, healed diabetic ulcers, decrease in the progression of complications and no complications, and their A1cs coming down to normal and some within normal range. Due to the economic situation in Nigeria, we are going to face a lot of challenges in terms crowd. Lots of people are not being paid their salaries, and the ones with diabetes and hypertension cannot afford their medications anymore. People are already coming to access the maintenance program for medications but are turned away because we barely have enough for the people in the program. We are hoping for more donations to be able to take on the task ahead of us this year. We take you for your support and looking forward for more support and your prayers for the people of Nigeria during this trial period     

African community health Initiative vision of making the Resource Center a central place for screening, educating the public on chronic diseases management and a place for storage and distribution of medical supplies for the needy is still in progress. Due to the high volume of people coming the center for maintenance program, we saw the need for a toilet facility at this place. This work is being done and still need more funding to complete it and put it into use. With the assistance of Friends of Nigeria organization; whose members are peace corps volunteers that went to Nigeria in the 1960s. They funded the building of the toilet facility which is nearly completed. For the toilet to be used and kept clean, we need a source of water supply, which could be done by digging a well. We have conducted a supply to see the level they have to reach before they get water and the cost of having a well. We want to thank all our previous donors and looking for more donors to help us achieve this goal. We cannot do it without your help     

This year’s maintenance program is facing some challenges due financial difficulties. We have been averaging total of 150 people per village during each visit. The reports coming from the three villages shows improvement in the glycemic levels for the diabetics and lowered blood pressure levels for the hypertensives. They are also reporting lots of people coming around for help that were not originally in the follow up program because they were not around during the outreach program in November. Due to the financial difficulties, we are having problems in keeping up with the medication supplies and the test strips for the blood glucose. Also transportation cost is higher and takes up some of the money. The program is yielding good result by reducing the number of deaths in these villages as a result on diabetes and hypertension, improving the life of individuals with these conditions, preventing and decreasing the rate of developing complications. This program will not be possible without support, and we continue to need support to be able to sustain this program. We hope to be able to provide sustained services to these individuals who are totally dependent on the program for their wellbeing