By Sarah Galvin | Director - PHASE Worldwide
Sango is a 20 year old Nepalese woman who lives with her in-laws in Keraunja, in the remote Gorkha district. Here, there is limited access to many vital services including healthcare, antenatal care (ANC) and postnatal care (PNC). Further adding to the difficulties of living in the region, her family were badly affected by the 2015 earthquakes and have struggled since to recover economically.
When Sango became pregnant, she attended all the classes on ANC provided by the PHASE Nepal healthcare teams in the area. When she first went into labour Sango was alone in her house, but luckily for her a FCHV and midwife were on hand to help her safely deliver her baby. Despite the successful delivery of the baby, they were unable to deliver the placenta, causing Sango extreme pain and posing an imminent threat. They immediately contacted the PHASE Nepal health staff, who were able to quickly attend to Sango. A PHASE Nepal health supervisor effectively administered oxytocin and delivered the placenta after 7 long hours. Afterwards, Sango was given regular PNC training including: breastfeeding, Kangaroo Mother Care (KMC), hygiene, and family planning. She was also warned about important postnatal signs of danger for herself and her newborn baby.
Without the PHASE healthcare team, Sango’s life would have been in serious danger. She said “"If not for the efforts and dedication of PHASE staff, I would not have survived. I would have died without ever holding my baby". It is work like this that make PHASE so important. In these remote areas, maternal morbidity and mortality are very high, with over 70% of pregnant woman treated being anaemic.PHASE currently have 13 Primary Healthcare Centre’s across some of the most remote areas in Nepal, including Sango’s village. They aim to supply vital medical supplies, training and healthcare whilst developing a level of trust and respect amongst the community.
Between the years of 2013-2014 PHASE health staff carried out 364 postnatal checks, and supported the birth of 212 new babies. In the coming years, PHASE hope to expand their healthcare projects into more communities, enabling them to help even more young women like Sango.
Without your support and valued donations PHASE would not be able to operate and women like Sango would not have access to vital, life-saving healthcare. Thank you for everything you have done so far.
Sarah and the PHASE Worldwide team
Links:
Project reports on GlobalGiving are posted directly to globalgiving.org by Project Leaders as they are completed, generally every 3-4 months. To protect the integrity of these documents, GlobalGiving does not alter them; therefore you may find some language or formatting issues.
If you donate to this project or have donated to this project, you can receive an email when this project posts a report. You can also subscribe for reports without donating.
