Hands for life: Neonatology for newborns in Benin

Dear friends,

Last May our Director, together with 5 Aleimar’s volunteers, went to Benin for our periodic monitoring trip. This opportunity gave us the chance to visit all our projects active in the country and especially to meet our local partner and all the children supported.

Arrived in Cotonou, in the extreme south of Benin, our volunteers went up to north and arrived in the center of the Country in “Les Collines” Department. During the first days of the trip our volunteers had the chance to visit “L’Abbraccio” Newborn Hospital of Sokponta, with whom Aleimar has been collaborating for years. During all these years of joint work we have supported the hospital creating a new department of neonatology that now has become a point of reference for all the region.

Aleimar and L'Abbraccio Hospital want to reach the most fragile children also going outside the hospital, on the field. That's why Aleimar supports a fundamental monitoring activity that the staff of the hospital carries out in the villages: the monthly screening of all the children that live in the most rural areas near Sokponta. Aleimar’s volunteers have been involved in the periodic visit in Kpossegan village and had the possibility to weigh a great number of children, collect their health parameters and the local staff redirected the most serious cases of malnutrition to L’Abbraccio Hospital. This has been a really emotionally engaging activity for all the staff and for all our volunteers! Thanks to these visits on the field, we can understand the real need of the local population and generate a culture based on prevention and mutual help!

The last monitoring trip has been the tangible evidence that the department of neonatology has been completed and it is fully functional. That’s why we can say that, thanks to your fundamental support, we have achieved our objectives and we have decided to close the project “Hands for life: Neonatology for newborns in Benin” on GlobalGiving.

Aleimar wants to ensure the sustainability of this project and to prevent and fight child malnutrition in these rural areas. Because of this, Aleimar would like to focus more on all the screening activities that L’Abbraccio Hospital carries out in the villages. Dear friends, if you want to continue to support Aleimar in Benin and all the children of the involved communities, we are glad to share with all of you our GlobalGiving project focused on food security: https://www.globalgiving.org/projects/nurse-me/

We want to share our sincere gratitude for all your help!