Approximately two months ago I (Eileen) was copied in on an
email from a doctor in the U.S. to our humanitarian couple in Moldova. He was interested in pursuing a maternal
newborn care project in Moldova and wanted our couple to be the eyes on the ground so
to speak. The name of the doctor was the
same as someone I knew 40 years ago while in nursing school. I responded back
to him and asked if he happened to be the same Rob Clark who lived on the SLC avenues
in 1977 and was married to Anne Clark.
As it turned out he was someone who was in my student ward when I was in
college. I was in the Relief Society Presidency of that ward and his wife was
the Relief Society President. We later
spoke on the phone and it was fun to catch up and hear about their family, and
in turn he also asked about ours. Many years
ago I left nursing school to go have a spinal fusion. At that time, I was released from my calling in the Relief
Society Presidency and moved back to Colorado for the operation. Rob and Anne were married, and I don’t
believe I have communicated with either one of them since. This interaction was a reminder of what a
small world it is within the church.
One of the major initiatives for LDS Charities is a program
entitled Maternal Newborn Care (MNC).
This program aims to teach appropriate medical skills to physicians, nurses
and midwifes in countries where perhaps the training is lacking. The programs include training the providers
with training in areas such as Neonatal
Resuscitation (NRT), Essential Care for Every Newborn (ECEB), Advanced Life
Support in Obstetrics (ALSO) and, Helping
Babies Breathe (HBB). Each program is structured to have a different level of intensity to meet the varying needs of the providers in the country
where training will take place. While we were in Indonesia we worked for over a
year to implement an HBB program for over 500 midwives and a few dozen doctors
and nurses in a rural area. We were released
from our mission just six weeks before the program was formally initiated. Although
we would have loved to have seen the training, we were pleased when a picture
of the doctors we had worked with ended up on the front page of our church’s
newspaper (the Church News).
Dr. Clark has been heavily involved in the MNC
program for many years and has done training programs in India, China and
Nepal. This is the first year he will be
working in any European country. He also
has his own practice in addition to being on several committees. He is
extremely busy. When he discovered that I was a former Newborn ICU and Labor
& Delivery nurse he asked if I would be willing to visit Moldova and assess
the needs there. This was a huge pleasure for me as I have missed my nursing
profession immensely. I had the support
and encouragement of my manager in Frankfurt and also my husband, which was a
blessing.
The history of Moldova is complicated and it has changed
hands over the years from being a Russian and/or Romanian territory to being
independent. Most of the people speak Romanian while some in the South and East
speak only Russian. The Russian Orthodox
Church is prevalent there and it was very common to see onion domed churches
with glistening golden roofs in almost every village. Statues of Jesus on the cross are commonplace,
even on the sides of the roads away from what would seem to be other signs of
community. When we first rode in the taxi to our hotel I was surprised to hear
the singing group BeeGees on the radio. We
soon found that American/British music from the 70s and 80s seemed to be played
everywhere, and often quite loudly.
Elder and Sister Vogelsberg have been serving in Moldova for
a little over 18 months. Elder
Vogelsberg did an excellent job of navigating the roads from one town to another. Some of the roads off the main highways were
covered with potholes. He would sometimes swerve to miss them and on occasion
had no choice but to drive over them. A portion of our journey was over dirt
roads. This gave us the opportunity to
see the villages, which we always enjoy doing.
It seemed that about half of the homes had an outhouse in the yard. I was told by our translator that many homes
do not have running water, but rather obtain their water from a nearby
well. Local wells were decorated
ornately with a handle and a pulley to obtain water from a bucket. Many of the wells have become contaminated
due to runoff from the fertilizers used in the nearby farming fields. There
have been several clean water projects in Moldova implemented by LDS Charities over the years.
We visited six hospitals trying to get a feel for the needs
of each local unit. The hospitals in
Moldova are divided into three levels.
We found that the lowest level (Level 1) hospitals were smaller with
fewer patients, however their staffs still tried hard to have the appropriate
equipment and care for their patients.
Unless there is an emergency, these hospitals only take patients who are
beyond 36 weeks gestation, with Level 2
hospitals taking patients from 32-36 weeks gestation, and the three
large Level 3 hospitals looking after the more critical obstetric patients and neonates. Dr. Clark had asked me if I would be willing
to visit a few of the smaller local hospitals to learn more about the need for
training, if any, in the rural areas.
We found that the hospitals were clean, with much of the
necessary equipment needed for care of the mothers and newborns. There was one
location where the director of the
hospital was a little skeptical and was reluctant to give us information or
allow us to see his units. In all of the other five hospitals the doctors
seemed proud to tell us about the care they were delivering and more than
willing to show us both their Labor & Delivery and Newborn Care units. In one location the neonatologist had posters
lining the walls of her unit. These posters were algorithms about what to do in
case of an emergency. In this particular
hospital they were in Russian. We were
pleased to see the LDS Charities logo in the corner of the poster. This doctor
had attended an NRT seminar/training sponsored by LDS Charities in 2011, and is still using the training manikin and written training materials which were
given to her. This was great news for us
as the whole purpose of the program is to “train the trainer,” then have the
trainers reach out to do training in their communities.
We do not know at this point if or what kind of program will
be implemented in Moldova. That decision
will be made by Dr. Clark when he visits in May. We did have multiple requests for NRT, HBB
and maternal emergencies training by the physicians. For me, it was extremely satisfying to be
back in a hospital again. I was grateful
for my good husband and companion who not only took notes for me while I
interviewed the staff, but also is savvy enough that he could prompt me in
certain situations to notice something which had gone unnoticed earlier. In one instance we were told by the director
of the hospital that many deliveries were done with forceps rather than a
vacuum suction. While in the delivery room, Russell asked me what a certain piece of
equipment was. It turned out it was the vacuum suction machine. When I
questioned the obstetrician as to whether forceps or vacuum suction was used in
their deliveries she looked in shock at us and said “ NO FORCEPS!” I was grateful for this good catch by my
husband, the accountant. I also
appreciate the efforts the Vogelsbergs took to transport us around and give us their
insights. Our interpreter, Doina was extremely valuable. She is a member of the church (only one of
about 100 who are actively involved in the church in Moldova). She
speaks Romanian, Russian and English fluently, and didn't hesitate with
any of the medical terminology. Her services were very needed as the only
individuals we met in our travels who spoke English were a family in one of the patient rooms. The mom
had just given birth the previous day and her husband and nine year-old son
were there visiting. Interestingly they all spoke English. We admired their beautiful baby and
congratulated them on their new addition.
Families with multiple children seem to be something we don't see often in Europe, other than in Moldova.
I was grateful for
the opportunity to be involved in a small way with this future MNC project. I
am hoping that perhaps it might take place before our departure next fall. Maybe we would be able to meet again some of
the good people we met on this visit.
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Russian Orthodox church under construction |
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You would normally only see one of these cars in the movies |
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Russell correctly identified this as being the "vacuum suction" |
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Doctors, Elder and Sister Vogelsberg and Eileen, neonatologist holding manikin from prior LDSC training |
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Notice the LDS Charities stamp |
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Algorithm for emergencies in Russian |
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Emergency supplies |
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Neonatologist with baby manikin used for training purposes |
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This family with their new baby all spoke English |
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Emergency supplies in NICU |
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Our translator Doina in black coat talks with obstetrician and neonatolgist in Russian |
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Once a grandma, always a grandma. I loved the newborns |
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Doctors and missionaries in one of the NICU units |
Very great post. Oh those newborns! Go MNC project!
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