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Seeing Our Work in Action―A Visit to Welkite Primary Healthcare Centre & Girar Health Post, southern Ethiopia

Blog Post by: James Harold

James Harold is Development Manager at ORBIS’s Ireland office in Dublin

Upon arriving in Addis Ababa, capital city of Ethiopia, for my first Flying Eye Hospital (FEH) visit, I was immediately struck by the welcoming and friendly nature of the citizens of this vibrant metropolis. Little did I know that the city was but a gateway to the socio-cultural wealth this fascinating country counts amongst its treasures.

Having attended a screening day for patients at Menelik II hospital on Monday 8 October, and witnessed the full might of the FEH in action the following day, we set out early on Wednesday morning for a project visit to Welkite Primary Healthcare Centre and later, Girar Health Post. In excellent company, joined by ORBIS International Board Member, Kevin McAllister, ORBIS EMEA Director, Rebecca Cronin, ORBIS Ethiopia Program Manager, Temesgen Kabeto and FEH Volunteer Faculty member (ophthalmologist), Dr. Rosalind Stevens, the excitement was palpable as we left the crowded streets behind. 

Travelling through the vibrant green countryside south of Addis Ababa, dotted with animated towns and villages, we were exposed to both the harsh reality of life in this poverty-stricken nation and the community spirit that transcends this hardship. Our first stop was Welkite Primary Healthcare Centre, about 110km/70m southwest of Addis Ababa. This small health centre was full to the brim with patients eagerly awaiting their turn to be seen by ORBIS-trained eye care workers. During our visit, we witnessed cataract surgery being carried out by local cataract surgeon Dereje Hailu. It was amazing to see this young man carry out life-changing surgery in the most basic of operating theatres. While chatting with patients and their relatives in the waiting room, I began to further appreciate the genuine respect and admiration the locals had for both ORBIS and our organization’s commitment to eliminating avoidable blindness.

Leaving Welkite, we continued south on the rocky road to Girar, a small outpost some 150km/95m southwest of Addis. Our arrival was met with the sort of jubilation one would expect from a state visit and the sleepy village suddenly seemed to roar with excitement as our ORBIS jeep came to a halt. We had arrived just in time. Across the burnt-red, dusty road Demisse Habte was mid-way through a trachoma screening day for local children at Girar Health Post. This small, simple structure was run by an enthusiastic team of local health workers. Popping our heads through the wooden entrance, we were greeted by a sea of curious, shy, and smiling faces. We watched as row after row of local children were screened for trachoma, a highly prevalent and blinding disease for many in this region.

The students of Girar Primary School illustrate the importance of hand and face washing in the battle against trachoma.

Shortly after, flanked on all sides by our new local friends, we headed to Girar Primary School for a very special drama piece aimed at highlighting the importance of hand and face washing in the fight to eradicate trachoma. Applause followed and when I asked if the entire audience knew just how important the performance was, I was met with a resounding response and scores of “I do, I do!!” Sadly, it was now time to depart but not before the entire school came out to cheer us on our way.

As I sat and watched the road ahead of us turn from dust to stone and finally, back to the familiar tarmac of Addis Ababa, I thought of how my experiences would never leave me. I have seen the phenomenal work carried out on a daily basis by ORBIS-trained eye care workers and the enormous impact their work has on the entire community. I was once again reminded that through providing the vital skills and knowledge needed to eliminate avoidable blindness, ORBIS is not only securing the future of those at immediate risk of blinding diseases, but that of the next generation too. 

 

Children from Girar Primary School

Photos Courtesy of: ORBIS Ireland

 

Through the ORBIS Lens: #GivingTuesday

“Through the ORBIS Lens” is a collection of photos showcasing the issues surrounding global eye health. Each week ORBIS will share our best photographs highlighting our efforts to eliminate avoidable blindness around the world.

 

 

 

Today is #GivingTuesday! 

In 2010, Baby Daffa was treated by long-time volunteer faculty Dr. Jamie Brandt, ORBIS visited Baby Daffa in Jakarta two years later to see his progress. 

Today Daffa is a healthy, happy two-year old boy who is discovering the beauty of the world around him.

Celebrate this #GivingTuesday by giving the gift of sight: http://bit.ly/LXwgts

Photo: Geoff Oliver Bugbee

 

 

Through the ORBIS Lens: School Screening in India

“Through the ORBIS Lens” is a collection of photos showcasing the issues surrounding global eye health. Each week ORBIS will share our best photographs highlighting our efforts to eliminate avoidable blindness around the world.

An eye screening at the J.V.S.D. Girls Senior Secondary School in New Delhi, India during an ORBIS program in 2007. ORBIS established a country office in India in 2000.

Photo: Tim Soter/ORBIS

What are you thankful for?

In 1621, the Plymouth colonists and Wampanoag Indians shared an autumn harvest feast that is acknowledged in the United States as the feast that inspired the Thanksgiving. For more than two centuries, days of thanksgiving were celebrated by individual colonies and states. In 1863, that President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed a national Thanksgiving Day to be held each November. Today, Thanksgiving is a time to gather with family and friends to remember what we are thankful for. In recognition of Thanksgiving, and as an appeal to donors in the US, this short video was created telling the story of Ester and Samuel, patients treated during ORBIS's 2012 Flying Eye Hospital Program in El Salvador.

The decision was made to treat Ester and Samuel, not just because their conditions provide stellar teaching cases, but also because of the dramatic and undeniable impact that vision would have on the entire family. ORBIS volunteer ophthalmologist Dr. Adolfo Guemes worked with the local medical team from El Salvador to restore their vision. "With one ‘hit’ you can change a local environment and make such an impact on a child's future. You can change their lives entirely. It's that simple," said Dr. Guemes. Watch the video to see their wonderful story. ORBIS is thankful Ester and Samuel have their vision. This year, what are YOU thankful for?

Photographs by: ORBIS Visual Communications Consultant, Geoff Oliver Bugbee   

 

Through the ORBIS Lens: Ester and Samuel

“Through the ORBIS Lens” is a collection of photos showcasing the issues surrounding global eye health. Each week ORBIS will share our best photographs highlighting our efforts to eliminate avoidable blindness around the world. 

Photo: Geoff Oliver Bugbee/ORBIS

San Salvador, El Salvador, ORBIS Flying Eye Hospital Program - August 2012--The Case of Ester (8) and Samuel (6) Garcia. Brother and sister pair who suffered from cataracts. Both were chosen as teaching cases by ORBIS Volunteer Faculty member Dr. Adolfo Guemes "because here was a family I recognized where their entire lives together would change dramatically," he said. Learn more about their story in a special video later today. 

Through the ORBIS Lens: Ethiopia FedEx Fellow

“Through the ORBIS Lens” is a collection of photos showcasing the issues surrounding global eye health. Each week ORBIS will share our best photographs highlighting our efforts to eliminate avoidable blindness around the world. 

Photo: Geoff Oliver Bugbee

Dr Ephrem Kibru (Center) pictured here with Dr. Alemayehu Sisay, Country Manager of ORBIS's Ethiopia Office (Left) and Dr. Ahmed Gomaa, Medical Director of the ORBIS Flying Eye Hospital. Dr. Kibru is a pediatric ophthalmologist from Menelik II Referral Hospital. He was selected as the recipient of the FedEX fellowship award after Week 2 of the FEH program. As part of a global initiative to combat preventable and treatable blindness, and in support of ORBIS’s skills exchange approach, FedEx's fellowship program awards a fellowship to a promising ophthalmologist to study at a leading global eye institute. 

Through the ORBIS Lens: ORBIS Zambia 2012

“Through the ORBIS Lens” is a collection of photos showcasing the issues surrounding global eye health. Each week ORBIS will share our best photographs highlighting our efforts to eliminate avoidable blindness around the world.  

 

ORBIS Flying Eye Hospital 2 Week Program - Ndola and Kitwe, Zambia

Photo: Geoff Oliver Bugbee/ORBIS

A Fairy Tale or Flying Eye Hospital?

Blog Post by Sarah Jacobs

Dr. Sarah Jacobs participated as an associate ophthalmologist during Week 1 of the ORBIS Flying Eye Hospital program in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. She is a graduate of the Mayo Medical School in Rochester, MN.

This afternoon, at the end of a day of paperwork and eye drops and cleaning and more paperwork, there was a knock on the door of the plane (that phrase sounded a lot more normal until I actually wrote it out). A woman from the ORBIS Ethiopian office was standing outside on the stairs with a group of grade school children who had arrived for a tour. A lecture was underway in the front classroom, and a surgery was in progress in the back OR. We silenced the kids with stern hushing, then led them to the laser procedure room.

“Ugh. Think of all the equipment in here that they can wreak havoc on,” said my inner curmudgeon. “Ooh! Remember the first time you looked at an eye?" said my better self.

I took the kids to the slit lamp in pairs, with one child as the patient and one as the doctor. I turned on the lights and adjusted the beams and let them look at each other’s eyes. Every child came away with an expression of curiosity and discovery on his or her face, as if they had just seen something truly amazing. Have you ever had a moment when you perfectly, clearly, joyfully remember why you do what you do? This moment was one of mine.

I grew up on a dead-end dirt road called Poverty Flat, in a small, windy northern Arizona town. I was the youngest of 5 kids in a family living well below the poverty line – grimy faces, hand-me-down clothes, pinto beans for dinner, and a backyard well for water. For most of my childhood, the town lacked specialty healthcare. Even if it had been available, we wouldn’t have been able to afford it. My mom had her first stroke when I was 12, and the general sense in my family was to accept it as fate. When my dad had a retinal detachment, the nearest retinal specialist was 5 hours away. We were poor. Care was beyond reach. Nothing could be done to change it. I hated the feeling of helplessly surrendering. 

I studied hard, earned scholarships, and worked three jobs to put myself through college. I ploughed on through medical school, planning to pursue general family practice medicine. During my third year of medical school, I was on a service trip to the Dominican Republic where I worked with an ophthalmologist who changed my entire career trajectory. The people there had a local expression describing the blind: “Bocas sin manos,” meaning mouths without hands – people who must be fed but can’t do anything to contribute back to their families or the community. Think what an impact it can have on their productivity, quality of life, and sense of self-worth when their vision is restored.

Nearly 5 years ago, a South American woman told me a story about a gigantic airplane with an operating room inside that came to her city and made the blind people see again. Fairy tale. Or so I thought. This week, I found myself standing inside that airplane, volunteering as an associate ophthalmologist for ORBIS. I’ve been on medical service trips before – Dominican Republic, Ghana, Bolivia, Haiti, Chile, South Africa– but the ORBIS experience is distinct in several ways.  

On other trips, we would arrive with hundreds of pounds of medication and equipment in duffel bags, then screen and treat hundreds of people each day.  Every time, the same question haunted me:  “What happens after we’re gone?”  With ORBIS, an in-country doctor has been caring for the patients before we arrive, and continues to provide care after the plane flies away.

The purpose of and ORBIS Flying Eye Hospital program is not to perform as many cases as possible, but to teach new skills and stronger techniques to the local doctors and nurses so that they can continue the work for years to come.

For example, on Monday during the screening for children with strabismus (misaligned eyes), I met a local provider we’ll call Dr Z. He had been doing some straightforward strabismus surgeries, but was not comfortable with his ability to do more complicated cases. His eagerness to improve was striking. By Tuesday, he was sitting shoulder-to-shoulder with the ORBIS surgeon in the OR. By Thursday, he was operating confidently on complex cases. By Friday, he was planning when and how to arrange surgeries for his own patients. ORBIS treated 8 strabismic children during my week in Ethiopia. Dr. Z will hopefully treat thousands. 

Through the ORBIS Lens: Flying Eye Hospital, Zambia

“Through the ORBIS Lens” is a collection of photos showcasing the issues surrounding global eye health. Each week ORBIS will share our best photographs highlighting our efforts to eliminate avoidable blindness around the world. 

 

Today, the ORBIS Flying Eye Hospital, in partnership with Kitwe Central Hospital and Republic of Zambia-Ministry of Health, completed its first-ever program in Zambia. This marks the 78th country visited by the Flying Eye Hospital. 

 

Photo: ORBIS

Through the ORBIS Lens: Al Ueltschi Humanitarian Award

“Through the ORBIS Lens” is a collection of photos showcasing the issues surrounding global eye health. Each week ORBIS will share our best photographs highlighting our efforts to eliminate avoidable blindness around the world. 

 

Congratulations to FedEx, and its founder, Frederick W. Smith, the recipients of the NBAA’s Al Ueltschi Humanitarian Award.

NBAA’s Ueltschi Humanitarian Award was established in 2006 in honor of Al Ueltschi, founder of FlightSafety International, whose lifetime of dedication to philanthropic causes set a high bar for giving back to communities. 

Watch this video honoring their great humanitarian

work here: 

http://bit.ly/UvMJJu

 

Photo: Geoff Oliver Bugbee