Disability Aid in Rural Peru

by Awamaki

Project Report | Dec 22, 2011
Getting Alex to School

By Kennedy Leavens | Executive Director

Dear friends,

Thank you for your support of Awamaki's Disabilities Campaign in the past months. The disabilities program is going well. Our volunteers now make regularl visits to six disabled individuals, and donations like yours fund ongoing needs like diapers, and one-time needs like visits to specialists and small home renovations.

This is an account by a volunteer, Nicole, who worked with Awamaki for 2 months. Nicole is 24 and is currently considering pursuing a Masters in International Public Health.

She writes:

"Visiting Alex, age 14, each week as a part of our disabilities campaign has been an experience incomparable to being with any child I have worked with. Alex was born with cerebral palsy and suffers from a hip injury which he incurred from falling out of bed a few years prior. After the first time meeting Alex and seeing his living conditions, I was both in shock and eager to return to see what progress could be made with him. He recently turned 15 years old, and spends close to 24 hours a day in his bed, besides the time we come to visit to take him outside and when his mother changes/bathes him. Mainly his mother works at the train station to be able to provide for the family. A few years ago, Alex unfortunately fell out of bed, broke his hip and for lack of medical attention it healed improperly. For this reason, a special wheelchair is needed to transport him to any type of school. Getting him to school has been our main goal since we began visiting him. As of recently, we have happily been informed by another non-profit in the area that a specialized wheelchair is now available for him. We are currently working on other obstacles that stand between him and school.

Due to the location of Alex´s house, we also need someone that would be able to transport him down a long hill to a combi which could transport him to school. We are almost positive one of our long-term volunteers will be able to accompany him, to ensure he can attend school once a week. All of these factors are currently being tackled, to eventually reach our goal of connecting him with an education. It has truly been an eye-opening experience seeing a young boy who at times shows signs of progress in terms of motor skills, awareness and emotions, and we continue to push for his attendance in a local school for disabled children. He is a wonderful boy to be around, and has a smile and laugh contagious to all those around him."

Our volunteers bring the extra energy that overworked families sometimes don't have. They go to doctor visits, bring diapers and connect families with resources. They and you make a difference in the lives of disabled individuals, enabling them to access social and health care resources that allow them to live a dignified, healthy life.

Thanks for reading! We look forward to keeping you updated about our progress getting Alex to school, and with the other disabled children with whom we work!

Yours,

Kennedy Leavens

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Sep 12, 2011
Daily Impact

By Nick Parker | Disabilities Campaign Leader

Brad, Awamaki Volunteer with Alex

The Awamaki disabilities program has five individuals both in Ollantaytambo and the outlying communities that we visit on a twice weekly basis. Alex is a twelve year old boy who was born with cerebral palsy who lives in the township of Phiri. Alex is generally bedridden and suffers a permanently dislocated left hip as a result of falling out of bed while being left unattended; the injury was undetected by his mother for some time and as a result the injury has now been determined to be inoperable. Secondary complications are contractions in his left arm and general wastage of his musculature due to inactivity. Alex is unable to converse but is able to convey his feelings with laughs and squeals; he particularly loves it when the Machu Picchu train goes by or more adventurous volunteers ride his family pigs! A usual visit with Alex involves checking whether or not his diaper is clean and dry and then carrying him outside into the sun and sitting with him outside doing passive exercises designed to encourage Alex to mobilize his left arm.We usually spend 30 to 45 minutes with Alex until he begins to tire or the weather is uncooperative. Our long term goal is to get Alex into a local school for children with disabilities as a means to socialize him and integrate him into the local community and as a means to provide some respite for his mother who has two other children and holds down a job selling corn in the Machu Picchu area.

Jose is a nineteen year old boy also born with cerebral palsy. He lives in Ollantaytambo and is cared for by his mother who sells Chicha at the local market. His days consist of being confined to his wheelchair in the family home listening to the radio. Jose is a lively character who absolutely loves his visits with our volunteers Jose is also non- verbal but laughs a lot when engaged. His primary complication currently is the contractions in both his feet and hamstrings. Physiotherapy,done by current volunteers over the last three months has resulted in a dramatic improvement in the mobility and flexion of Jose´s ankles feet and hamstrings, to the point where Jose has made numerous attempts to rise from a kneeling position to a standing position with only moderate support given by volunteers. He quite obviously has the strength to stand and our goal right now is to secure suitable braces for his legs to further improve the bio mechanics of his feet and ankles. A typical visit with Jose includes wheeling him outside via a ramp that we built for him into his courtyard and helping him onto a mattress.Here we take Jose through a series of stretches designed to improve the alignment from his knees to his toes. Also we work on the flexibility in his hamstrings and ankles in an effort to counter the effect of his contractions.

The Awamaki disabilities program has certainly proved to be one of the most popular aspects of our volunteers stays here in Ollantaytambo and the growing interest has made it possible to reach more and more individuals in need of help both locally and in the more remote communities.

Links:

www.awamaki.org

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Jun 21, 2011
Update on Awamaki's Health Program

By Noah Silber-Coats | Program Director

Dear Friends and Supporters,

It has been a long time since our last update and a lot has taken place in the intervening months. I would like to take this opportunity to update you on our current work and future plans.

The most active aspect of our health program recently has been in working with disabled individuals throughout the district of Ollantaytambo. After conducting a general census of the population to identify indivudal cases and determine the needs of those individuals we have continued work with a group of ten patients. So far we have helped two receive wheelchairs, gotten a walker for a young woman who suffers from epillepsy and an orthotic shoe for a polio survivor. Some of the assistance we hope to offer in the near future includes getting a hearing aid for a hearing-impaired boy, corrective eye surgery for another and epilepsy medication for another. See the attached link for more information on some of the patients we work with.

In the area of health education we are currently in the planning and fundraising stage of a new outreach program. The idea of this project is to work with women from the indigenous community of Patacancha to train them as community health promoters. Awamaki has a long-standing relationship with this community through our fair-trade textiles project and we are excited about the possibility of expanding this relationship into the area of community health.

We are currently participating in the South America “Open Challenge” Fundraiser which is being sponsored by Global Giving’s Clarissa Driban. If we can raise the most of any project by June 30^th then Clarissa will make a monthly donation of $100 for one year. All of the money that we raise for the project during this period will be designated to offering assistance to the highest priority patients in our disability outreach program.

Please help us spread the word about this fundraiser so that we can reach our goal and offer much-needed assistance to our beneficiaries. Thank you for your continued support!

Links:

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