I keep
neglecting to blog, work’s been so incredibly busy, that when I’m on the
computer in the evenings and not working, the last thing I think about doing is
typing. However, keeping a blog, is like keeping a record of what’s happening
here. And, my goodness… a lot’s happening!!!
Where to
start?
Today – I’m
running the joint clinic at the Vihiga EARC this morning. It’s a quiet morning,
and I’ve spent it playing ball with a cute 4 year old called Bob. In walks this
beautiful, confident little girl. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. The
last time I’d seen her she couldn’t walk as a result of spending 5 years in a constricted,
spasm state. She could talk when I last saw her, having just started speaking
again after 5 years in an almost vegetative state…Maurine. I’d written about Maurine
on my blog when I was here last year, from the despair at having to tell her
mother that there was nothing we could do, apart from support her feeding, and
as she was at such a high risk of aspirating, we were really waiting for her to
die… to the miracle of hearing this beautiful little girl speak again after
being not being able to for 5 years… to the thought of her going to school.
Incredible. And there she was, coming into the assessment centre with her
mother to get the letter needed for her to be able to start in the mainstream
school… So proud and inspired by this little girl. I’ll be following up as she
starts school – I promise not to be the ‘typical mzungu’ and cry when I see her
there.
Conference:
I was
incredibly fortunate to attend the 5th East African Conference on
Communication Disabilities in early September. 120 people attended from 16
different countries, 7 of those were African. It was an inspiring 4 days full
of people with so much interest and passion in developing speech and language
therapy in East Africa, sharing knowledge and ideas, and pushing forward as a
profession here.
I was so
nervous as the Yellow House crew: me, David and Martin, were up to present on
the Thursday morning. Our presentation was all about the challenges in building
a multidisciplinary team within Western Kenya… We were to talk about the
positives and negatives of what’s happened with Yellow House over the last
18months, what we’ve learnt from it and how, as an organisation we’ve moved
forward. We received a lot of wonderful praise and comments after our
presentation. I think we broke down some of the barriers organisations traditionally
put up when talking about themselves; as we spoke honestly about some of the
hardest things we’ve had to deal with, which most organisations don’t tend to
talk about. It was a really special
conference, and I’m already looking forward to the next one in 2015, both in
terms of where Yellow House will be as an organisation then, but more
importantly, where speech and language therapy will be as a profession in East
Africa.
Patients –
Did a bit of
maths a few weeks ago, at the moment David and I are offering on average 200
appointments a month – that includes school visits, hospital appointments, ward
rounds, community visits and assessment days at the EARCs. Our target budget
for 2014 for our project costs is $200 a month (for the 2 of us). $1 an
appointment… It literally blows my mind.
Shameless
plug – I know many of my family and friends have already supported my work
here, but if this is something you feel you’d like to support further, please
visit our website: www.yellowhousechildrens.org
I would say
around 50% of the people we now see for an initial assessment come back for
therapy. This is compared to over 90% of the people we saw last year who DIDN’T
come back for therapy. Huge breakthrough for us as a service, but it’s also a
bit mad, as it means we’re both extremely busy.
Edna – my little
star – continues to do well and we were really lucky to have specialist AAC
(assistive and augmentative communication) speech and language therapist,
Joanne Fry, come and work with us for a couple of weeks in September. She met
with Edna and her family to start the process of developing a communication
aid. I’m excited to carry on and develop this work further… Especially because
I know what a cheeky personality she has, and I can’t wait to help her use a
communication aid to show this off to other people.
Her mother
Florence starts to work with Yellow House this month as our Mentoring Mum. Her
role at the moment is to help set up, and then run a mum’s support group in
Kisumu, demonstrating the importance of positive interaction with their child,
attending therapy, making medical and educational decisions and knowing where
to access the support. This role will be developed during next year as we hope
to get the funds to be able to offer this service across our other projects in
Vihiga, Kakamega and Mumias.
Timothy – a charming
60 year old man who had a stroke in 2012. What a hard working and dedicated
gentleman… He comes to therapy EVERY week, he carries out the work I set him
and as a result, this man who spoke jargon and had severe word finding
difficulties, can now have a conversation, has the confidence to be seen in his
community and shout out ‘hello’ to his peers when he sees them from a matatu
(and then laugh at my obvious shocked and impressed face as I sit next to him
and observe…)… I loved it a few weeks ago when his physiotherapist, who
(through no fault of her own) has absolutely no idea what I do with my
patients, apart from look at pictures, make them do silly face exercises and
make random noises…. observed Timothy speaking to me and said “you made him
talk”… Wonderful.
