The first Friday of every month is the day of our clinic outreach. During this outreach Jen travels through the district doing follow-up care for many of our patients with Hypertension and Diabetes. Currently there are around 15 elderly patients she sees every month to check their blood-pressure, blood sugar, and restock their meds.
One of the biggest barriers we’ve found with keeping our patients consistent with their medications was their ability to regularly come to the clinic for follow-up appointments and medicine refills. For many of these patients motorbike transportation to the clinic was too expensive and walking for several hours was too difficult, so they would hoard their medicine, taking it every few days so it would last longer, or only come to the clinic when their blood-pressure or blood sugar became so high it caused them to actually feel sick. Allowing their blood-pressure or blood-sugar to yo-yo is putting our patients at even greater risk for complications like nerve damage or stroke which can have devastating consequences for the entire family. So, we decided bring their care closer to home.
Though there was a small adjustment period, now that our patients know they can rely on seeing someone from the clinic every month they’ve become much more compliant with their medicines, and their chronic illnesses have become much more controlled.
After getting her pressure checked this month, Nora spoke just about the only English words she knows, “Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you!” Nora is a widow with no living children to provide for her. We take care of Nora and love her very much. She was extremely happy to see Jen and have her blood pressure checked, and she was over-the-moon to have her picture go Stateside!
Po River Medical Clinic 