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Posts Tagged Children

Traditional Birth Attendant Training in Ndola

Traditional Birth Attendants practice the Basic Newborn Examination.

In the West, we take it for granted that when women are ready to give birth, they will be taken to the hospital and given state-of-the-art care by a team of well-trained doctors and nurses.  Even if a mother chooses to give birth at home, she is in the care of qualified, licensed midwives.  Should there be any complications, mother and child are transported to the nearest hospital and placed in the care of the aforementioned hospital medical staff.   Unfortunately, this is not always true in the rest of the world—especially in a place like Zambia.

Traditional Birth Attendants, or TBAs as they are more commonly known, are the key to the birthing system in rural Zambia.   Most Zambian mothers living in rural areas cannot afford transport to the modern hospitals and clinics in urban districts, so they rely on the expertise of TBAs to help them through the process of giving birth.

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Asher’s New Feet

Little Asher

Last week I travelled to Ndola—a city in Zambia’s Copperbelt province.  It’s a beautiful city—lush with flowering jacaranda trees and green evergreens (unusual as Zambia is in its hot and dry season).

In the midst of all of Ndola’s natural beauty, I met its greatest gem—Asher.  Asher is a sweet little 2-year-old boy.  He loves to play, run and jokes around like most toddlers all over the world, except for one thing—Asher was born with clubfeet.

A week after he was born, his mother, Jenny, took little Asher to a local hospital.  There, Asher went through 20 castings and was even given a tenotomy (a minor surgery to release the tendons in the foot), but the results were unsuccessful.  After a year and a half, Asher’s condition worsened.  His feet began turning inward, and he could no longer walk or stand.

Asher’s parents were completely devastated.  They blamed themselves for Asher’s clubfeet.  Both of Asher’s parents were victims of polio and disabled as a result of the disease.  For this reason, they felt that their disability was the cause of Asher’s.

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Coming Home Full of Memories

The interviews are done.  The video has been shot.  The photos preserved for posterity.

We are packing our bags and headed for home tomorrow on a flight out of San Pedro Sula. It was a short, but sweet, visit to this beautiful country — and with its beautiful people.

I’ll have a lot of memories of the kids, moms and dads we met.  But the one that’ll probably stick with me the most is the vision of a child named Isaiah.  He’s probably the toughest kid I’ve ever met.

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On the Road in Honduras

As I type this, we are headed back from La Ceiba, a town about three hours north of San Pedro Sula.  We visited with some kids who have had surgery at the CURE Honduras hospital.

One of the benefits of spending hours in a van traveling through the Honduran countryside is getting some time with Ruth Castro, CURE Honduras’ executive director.

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At the Honduras Hospital

Our first full day in Honduras. This country, like every country around the world, has its unique traits (like the taste of its tortillas compared to tortillas in other Latin American countries) as well as the more globally ubiquitous aspects (Coca Cola signs everywhere). I love its beautiful green, rolling mountains and warm, friendly and open people.

Today, my colleague, Bryce Alan Flurie, and I started bright and early at 6:45 a.m. when the hospital’s executive director, Ruth Castro, picked us up in the big white CURE van to take us on the 15-minute ride to the hospital.

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Insights into Niger

Leron Lehman, the executive director of our new hospital in Niger, shared some insights into the challenges the country currently faces.

You can read the article here.

Please keep that country in your prayers. Also please keep everyone in the hospital in your prayers as they prepare for its scheduled mid-October opening.

Affero Project Voters Choose CURE

The Affero Project is an online community that votes every month to choose a charity to support.

And we are excited to report, they chose CURE International as their August winner!

CURE will receive a donation that will help fund 30 surgeries for children at our hospitals in Africa.

Thanks to the super awesome community at The Affero Project;  we are grateful you chose CURE.  Thirty African kids will have changed lives because of you all.

Post GO Team Trip Thoughts

Maureen Sloan, who was part of our GO Team to Uganda this summer, shared these recollections about her trip to the country…

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Maureen Sloan

Pearls…our first morning in Uganda we looked at James 1:2-5 that speaks about counting trials and irritations as joy! This thought stuck with the GO Team members throughout our time.

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Curing Clubfoot in the Developing World

Clubfoot is one of the world’s most common disabilities in children and, in turn, one of the most common conditions CURE treats. Learn more about how we are curing children with this condition by watching this video.

Want to help? You can make a difference right now.

Germania’s Story

The normally serene courtyard bustles with activity…A bearded man pulls his camera out of his large equipment bag…Nearby a small group of people converses in what sounds like three different languages…Chickens scurry to stay out of the way…Less concerned is Rocky the dog, who loiters casually under a tree.

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Germania after her surgery

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