It was the first day I introduced my newborn assessment sheet to the maternity ward. Previously there had been nowhere to record any infant data in the ward…but I’m hoping with the addition of this sheet to mother’s charts that the nurses will begin to collect information on the newborns.
However, it’s a tricky proposition. In Ghana, children under one year old are not considered human beings. They don’t have funerals (which are a big deal in Ghana…lots of people get together…you are forced to pretend to cry or you owe the family a goat…serious stuff), and their death is not considered as painful as an adults. When a baby dies they don’t say the baby is dead but that “he has gone back” (back to God presumably…) and the phrase “lets give it to God” is also common when discussing infant death. It’s a country-wide issues…and it’s also an issue of needing more personal, space and motivation from staff to take care of the babies.
So I’m hoping that my interventions at least make people start to think about life differently. I wonder how pro-choice advocates would handle Ghana…though I’m sure none ever come! I lead a teaching group today with the nurses…we collaborated and they made suggestions on how to make the form better. Fingers crossed they use it.
Aside from the constant drama of the hospital we made a very good friend in town – Matilda. She is from Kintampo, and she sells us fabric and sets us up with tailors to get dresses made. It’s an extravagant relationships because the dresses we are having made are of bold patterns, and wild fabrics. But she is a very caring person and amazing tour guide and showed us the whole of Kintampo after work. It’s an enormous town! We bought a bag of mangos off the street for less than two dollars and practiced walking through the streets balancing them on our heads like Africans do.
No comments:
Post a Comment