| June 2003
Covenant Hospital
Mombin Crochu, Haiti
Community Health Program
Dear Friends,
Thanks to an education grant from the PC(USA)’s International
Health Ministries Office (IHMO), residents of the rural Commune
of Mombin Crochu, Haiti, recently moved another step closer to
realizing their objective of having a community health program
to serve them in the many scattered mountain neighborhoods of
this region. Working through Covenant Hospital, a health mission
partnership with the Episcopal Diocese of Haiti, the IHMO has
held to a strong commitment of assisting these isolated communities
to develop priorities and goals for their own system of wellness,
preventive medicine, and primary health care.
Two years ago, IHMO funded training for several individuals of
the Mombin Crochu region who had been chosen by their communities
to become agents d’sante, community health workers. They
were certified at a program run by Hopital Ste. Croix, another
Haiti health partnership between PC(USA) and the Episcopal diocese,
with training emphasis on all phases of preventive health, including
sanitation, family planning, vaccination, pre-natal care, HIV,
and early illness detection.
Early this spring, Covenant Hospital again turned to the PC(USA)’s
International Health Ministries Office to help the several communities
of Mombin Crochu mature their understanding of how they can achieve
solutions to the health problems they face in this poor region
of a very poor country. IHMO director Dorothy Brewster-Lee, M.D.,
quickly enlisted experienced consultants from Global Health Action,
an international organization specializing in transformative training
for communities that seek to overcome health problems and improve
health leadership. For three information-packed days, Yolanta
Melamed, M.D., MPH, the director of programs of Global Health
Action, led a training in Mombin Crochu for the agents d'sante
themselves and representatives from their respective health committees.
She was assisted by Jean Eliott-Pierre, M.D., who is familiar
with GHA training principles and has worked with them in previous
seminars in Haiti. Lively discussion and a good measure of laughter
characterized both the small and larger group sessions, as course
facilitators molded the participants into a working group and
drew on their knowledge, life experience, and vision in order
to demonstrate and practice proven techniques that encourage and
equip them to be leaders in positive changes for the health of
their families, their communities, and their country. Hard work
and persistence was rewarded at the seminar’s conclusion
when each of 28 participants received GHA’s certificate
of completion and congratulations from the facilitators.
Covenant Hospital plans to continue clinical support and ongoing
training and supervision of the community health program for the
Mombin Crochu region under the direction of PC(USA)’s International
Health Ministries Office.
Paul and Joan McLain
The 2003 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p.
250
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