NEWS FEATURE DEVELOPING COUNTRIES /
1 m
•TV
20 Nursing Standard July 29/Volume 6/Number 45/1992
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Bringing relief to the streets Since the early days, the Calcutta Rescue Fund has grown both in terms of the number of people helped and the scope of the projects set up. Barbara Battista reports. The massive iron bridge of Howrah is I pavement to give medical aid to the des are encouraged to support their wives three feet longer during the intense heat titute people of this city. He is still there. who wish to limit the size of their fam of the day than it is by night. As the only His organisation, Calcutta Rescue Fund, ilies. Selected groups of women, a few bridge across the river in Calcutta, it is continues to grow both in the numbers from each assigned village, are learning used by more than half a million people of patients it serves and the services it together how to improve health and pre daily. A river of people, bullock carts, offers. The past year has been one of vent disease and accidents. They in turn vehicles and noise competing for the eye consolidation, strengthening the foun go back to their village to share this and mind of the onlooker with the broad, dations of the service, increasing local knowledge with the other mothers. swiftly moving waters of the Hoogly staff involvement in the projects, In an outlying village the spinning below. expanding teaching programmes and and weaving project is about to be imple | defining aims for the future. mented. Two six-month courses will be Waiting for help There is now a team of seven doctors run each year. The five students on each The tributary of the holy river Ganga in each clinic. Some are formulating pro course will be housed and supported dur flows east to the Bay of Bengal, 250 miles grammes on important health issues ing their training. At the end of the away. Like a great artery it transports which, in some cases, challenge sensitive course they will be set up in selfgoods and people, washes oxen and car areas of balance in traditional attitudes. employment, making sarees, lunghis (a ries corpses; it receives daily reverence Local doctors have greater understand type of skirt worn by the men), and ban from the worshippers in the ghats, and ing of customary practice within the dages. These will be purchased by where its waters lap the muddy banks it family, for example. Among the new pro Calcutta Rescue Fund for the needy. feeds scavenging dogs and pigs. We have been hoping to do work in grammes is a family planning service for On the banks of this great river, next men whereby information on available rural areas using mobile clinics. The pos to the burial ghat in the north of the city, methods is discussed with them. They sibility of this is increasing since you will find people working early in the morning setting up a broad awning. Under this, a team of doctors and nurs es will be sheltered from the sun while they work. Soon the people will come. They will begin to arrive at 5.30am, some from villages, others from the patch of pavement they call home, or a space between the railway tracks where they ML live. About 3-500 people will squat together patiently waiting for help. The clinic will not close until they have all been seen and cared for. There is little other available help for Calcutta’s poor. This clinic at Nimtolla Ghat is one of two, the other being on the pavement at Middleton Row in the heart of Calcutta. Between them they will treat 12,000 patients every month and this number will increase by about 700 monthly. It was in 1980 that British doctor Jack Preger first sat down alone on the The teeming streets of Calcutta, a city offering little support to its poor and needy. i •
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July 29/Volume 6/Number 45/1992 Nursing Standard 21 Downloaded from RCNi.com by ${individualUser.displayName} on Sep 15, 2016. For personal use only. No other uses without permission. Copyright © 2016 RCNi Ltd. All rights reserved.
NEWS FEATURE DEVELOPING COUNTRIES
't is nine o’clock on Saturday
bustee where he lives without sanitation
How
morning. The clinic is in full
it was difficult to keep it clean. We take
described. The dressing finally com
‘I
he
must
have
felt
cannot
be
.swing. The man sits alone amid
him to the dressings area. Giving time
pleted, he stands up, stumbles towards
the crowd of waiting patients, head bent
for the painkiller to take effect, the task
the dressings table. He falls to his knees,
towards the ground. He is about 60
of cleaning his horribly infected wound
his hands tightly clasped; I realise he is
years old. Looking haggard and deso
is begun. Bit by bit the cleaning con
praying. This moment I will never for
late, and in a tremendous amount of
tinues for an hour. We stop to give him
get. A few minutes later he stands again,
pain, he glances towards the doctor in
a break. He has had his head down con
looks around and starts to thank us all
fear, hope and sheer desperation. He had
tinuously, holding a plate in his hands.
with warm and genuine affection.
tried to get help from many places but
He looks at us both and says: ‘Two
We organise antibiotics, painkillers,
none were able or willing to admit him.
hundred.’ We wonder at this and he says
clean clothes and some food for him to
The covering on his head, a dirty
in Bengali: ‘You have just removed the
take home. One hour later he is still
orange rag, is removed by the doctor.
two hundredth maggot from my head.’
standing by the dressings area. He has,
The man avoids eye contact as the
He has been counting these wriggling
despite his haggard look, a beautiful
unbearable stench, almost choking, is
pests as they are pulled out with forceps
smile. We ask him to return on a daily
released. At the very top of his head,
and dropped on the plate.
basis; he nods enthusiastically.
having eaten through the scalp, are two
After another 38, the pus and dirt
Back the next day, he is a changed
big cavities separated by a bridge of
also removed, healthy pink tissue can be
man! With his beard shaved and a
skin. Both are filled to the brim with
seen underneath. The procedure is com
change of clothes he looks a generation
pus and infection. His hair and beard
pleted in two hours, the whole area
younger. He is, in fact, 35 years old’.
are crawling with lice.
cleaned, packed and covered with a
His medical history revealed a fall
clean white dressing. Conversation has
Enda O'Sullivan RGN. RMN. is now
two weeks before. In the run down
been at a bare minimum the entire time.
working at Valentia Hospital,Kerry.
discussions are in progress. When we
to have tuberculosis. Treatment is given
| and life skills are taught in the appro
have permission, our next step will be to
where necessary and all children receive
priate language. When children progress
raise funds to initiate and run the pro
a nutritious diet at school. The nurse has
well and show a keen interest in further
ject, then to recruit male nurses to work
a programme in which she teaches the
study, places are found for them in reg ular schools.
in them. Great progress is being made in
teachers one health topic every week.
the school. The daily attendance is now
This is passed on in her presence to the
In March, 275 babies benefited from
about 350 pupils. They attend in four
children and, hopefully, by them to their
the special care programme - this is a
shifts,
families. The children love this oppor
marked improvement on last year’s fig
tunity to learn.
ures.
being
picked
up
from,
and
returned safely to, the areas in which they live. All 11 teachers are local. A local pae
Twenty-six
babies
needed
hospitalisation and places were found for
diatrician presides over the health team
Expensive surgery
of four medical staff.
Their curriculum includes health and
One of the most expensive items on
medically
hygiene subjects. Music and drama are
the budget is the provision of heart
screened. Ten per cent have been found
popular, too. Basic numeracy, literacy,
surgery in special cases. This necessitates
The
children
are
all
them.
sending the patient, together with a rel ative and a clinic staff member, to either Vellore or Madras for the duration of the treatment.
A
15-year-old
boy
with
Fallot’s tetralogy, who had been given only six weeks to live, and a young woman in her 20s who needed double valve
replacements
were
two
recent
cases. Both are doing well after success ful surgery. We always need
trained
volunteer
nurses who can stay for a minimum of six months. The experience is guaranteed to change your life and way of thinking for ever!
Barbara Battista EN(G). is shortly to start a care of the dying course. Calcutta Rescue Fund can be contacted at PO Dr Jack Preger of the Calcutta Rescue Fund offering advice at one of the street clinics.
Box 52, Brentford, Middlesex TW8 8PS.
22 Nursing Standard July 29/Volume 6/Number 45/1992
Downloaded from RCNi.com by ${individualUser.displayName} on Sep 15, 2016. For personal use only. No other uses without permission. Copyright © 2016 RCNi Ltd. All rights reserved.
%
1 m
•TV
20 Nursing Standard July 29/Volume 6/Number 45/1992
Downloaded from RCNi.com by ${individualUser.displayName} on Sep 15, 2016. For personal use only. No other uses without permission. Copyright © 2016 RCNi Ltd. All rights reserved.
Bringing relief to the streets Since the early days, the Calcutta Rescue Fund has grown both in terms of the number of people helped and the scope of the projects set up. Barbara Battista reports. The massive iron bridge of Howrah is I pavement to give medical aid to the des are encouraged to support their wives three feet longer during the intense heat titute people of this city. He is still there. who wish to limit the size of their fam of the day than it is by night. As the only His organisation, Calcutta Rescue Fund, ilies. Selected groups of women, a few bridge across the river in Calcutta, it is continues to grow both in the numbers from each assigned village, are learning used by more than half a million people of patients it serves and the services it together how to improve health and pre daily. A river of people, bullock carts, offers. The past year has been one of vent disease and accidents. They in turn vehicles and noise competing for the eye consolidation, strengthening the foun go back to their village to share this and mind of the onlooker with the broad, dations of the service, increasing local knowledge with the other mothers. swiftly moving waters of the Hoogly staff involvement in the projects, In an outlying village the spinning below. expanding teaching programmes and and weaving project is about to be imple | defining aims for the future. mented. Two six-month courses will be Waiting for help There is now a team of seven doctors run each year. The five students on each The tributary of the holy river Ganga in each clinic. Some are formulating pro course will be housed and supported dur flows east to the Bay of Bengal, 250 miles grammes on important health issues ing their training. At the end of the away. Like a great artery it transports which, in some cases, challenge sensitive course they will be set up in selfgoods and people, washes oxen and car areas of balance in traditional attitudes. employment, making sarees, lunghis (a ries corpses; it receives daily reverence Local doctors have greater understand type of skirt worn by the men), and ban from the worshippers in the ghats, and ing of customary practice within the dages. These will be purchased by where its waters lap the muddy banks it family, for example. Among the new pro Calcutta Rescue Fund for the needy. feeds scavenging dogs and pigs. We have been hoping to do work in grammes is a family planning service for On the banks of this great river, next men whereby information on available rural areas using mobile clinics. The pos to the burial ghat in the north of the city, methods is discussed with them. They sibility of this is increasing since you will find people working early in the morning setting up a broad awning. Under this, a team of doctors and nurs es will be sheltered from the sun while they work. Soon the people will come. They will begin to arrive at 5.30am, some from villages, others from the patch of pavement they call home, or a space between the railway tracks where they ML live. About 3-500 people will squat together patiently waiting for help. The clinic will not close until they have all been seen and cared for. There is little other available help for Calcutta’s poor. This clinic at Nimtolla Ghat is one of two, the other being on the pavement at Middleton Row in the heart of Calcutta. Between them they will treat 12,000 patients every month and this number will increase by about 700 monthly. It was in 1980 that British doctor Jack Preger first sat down alone on the The teeming streets of Calcutta, a city offering little support to its poor and needy. i •
.
%
July 29/Volume 6/Number 45/1992 Nursing Standard 21 Downloaded from RCNi.com by ${individualUser.displayName} on Sep 15, 2016. For personal use only. No other uses without permission. Copyright © 2016 RCNi Ltd. All rights reserved.
NEWS FEATURE DEVELOPING COUNTRIES
't is nine o’clock on Saturday
bustee where he lives without sanitation
How
morning. The clinic is in full
it was difficult to keep it clean. We take
described. The dressing finally com
‘I
he
must
have
felt
cannot
be
.swing. The man sits alone amid
him to the dressings area. Giving time
pleted, he stands up, stumbles towards
the crowd of waiting patients, head bent
for the painkiller to take effect, the task
the dressings table. He falls to his knees,
towards the ground. He is about 60
of cleaning his horribly infected wound
his hands tightly clasped; I realise he is
years old. Looking haggard and deso
is begun. Bit by bit the cleaning con
praying. This moment I will never for
late, and in a tremendous amount of
tinues for an hour. We stop to give him
get. A few minutes later he stands again,
pain, he glances towards the doctor in
a break. He has had his head down con
looks around and starts to thank us all
fear, hope and sheer desperation. He had
tinuously, holding a plate in his hands.
with warm and genuine affection.
tried to get help from many places but
He looks at us both and says: ‘Two
We organise antibiotics, painkillers,
none were able or willing to admit him.
hundred.’ We wonder at this and he says
clean clothes and some food for him to
The covering on his head, a dirty
in Bengali: ‘You have just removed the
take home. One hour later he is still
orange rag, is removed by the doctor.
two hundredth maggot from my head.’
standing by the dressings area. He has,
The man avoids eye contact as the
He has been counting these wriggling
despite his haggard look, a beautiful
unbearable stench, almost choking, is
pests as they are pulled out with forceps
smile. We ask him to return on a daily
released. At the very top of his head,
and dropped on the plate.
basis; he nods enthusiastically.
having eaten through the scalp, are two
After another 38, the pus and dirt
Back the next day, he is a changed
big cavities separated by a bridge of
also removed, healthy pink tissue can be
man! With his beard shaved and a
skin. Both are filled to the brim with
seen underneath. The procedure is com
change of clothes he looks a generation
pus and infection. His hair and beard
pleted in two hours, the whole area
younger. He is, in fact, 35 years old’.
are crawling with lice.
cleaned, packed and covered with a
His medical history revealed a fall
clean white dressing. Conversation has
Enda O'Sullivan RGN. RMN. is now
two weeks before. In the run down
been at a bare minimum the entire time.
working at Valentia Hospital,Kerry.
discussions are in progress. When we
to have tuberculosis. Treatment is given
| and life skills are taught in the appro
have permission, our next step will be to
where necessary and all children receive
priate language. When children progress
raise funds to initiate and run the pro
a nutritious diet at school. The nurse has
well and show a keen interest in further
ject, then to recruit male nurses to work
a programme in which she teaches the
study, places are found for them in reg ular schools.
in them. Great progress is being made in
teachers one health topic every week.
the school. The daily attendance is now
This is passed on in her presence to the
In March, 275 babies benefited from
about 350 pupils. They attend in four
children and, hopefully, by them to their
the special care programme - this is a
shifts,
families. The children love this oppor
marked improvement on last year’s fig
tunity to learn.
ures.
being
picked
up
from,
and
returned safely to, the areas in which they live. All 11 teachers are local. A local pae
Twenty-six
babies
needed
hospitalisation and places were found for
diatrician presides over the health team
Expensive surgery
of four medical staff.
Their curriculum includes health and
One of the most expensive items on
medically
hygiene subjects. Music and drama are
the budget is the provision of heart
screened. Ten per cent have been found
popular, too. Basic numeracy, literacy,
surgery in special cases. This necessitates
The
children
are
all
them.
sending the patient, together with a rel ative and a clinic staff member, to either Vellore or Madras for the duration of the treatment.
A
15-year-old
boy
with
Fallot’s tetralogy, who had been given only six weeks to live, and a young woman in her 20s who needed double valve
replacements
were
two
recent
cases. Both are doing well after success ful surgery. We always need
trained
volunteer
nurses who can stay for a minimum of six months. The experience is guaranteed to change your life and way of thinking for ever!
Barbara Battista EN(G). is shortly to start a care of the dying course. Calcutta Rescue Fund can be contacted at PO Dr Jack Preger of the Calcutta Rescue Fund offering advice at one of the street clinics.
Box 52, Brentford, Middlesex TW8 8PS.
22 Nursing Standard July 29/Volume 6/Number 45/1992
Downloaded from RCNi.com by ${individualUser.displayName} on Sep 15, 2016. For personal use only. No other uses without permission. Copyright © 2016 RCNi Ltd. All rights reserved.
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