Physical Health Uganda Project #10843

Saving Lives With Emergency Care in Rural Uganda

by Global Emergency Care

Saving Lives With Emergency Care in Rural Uganda

Project Report | May 5, 2013
Happy Mother's Day to mothers around the world!

By Stacey Chamberlain | GECC Co-founder

Limited means of travel lead to dangerous injuries

As Mother's Day approaches and we take time to reflect on how much we appreciate our mothers, we at GECC wanted to share with you a report from the field about some mothers whose lives were recently saved due to GECC's Emergency Care Practitioners (ECPs) in Uganda.

Report from the Field

Recently, a group of passengers were traveling on the back of a truck and fell out. (See attached picture for an example of this dangerous travel which is the only option for many.) Five patients were brought simultaneously to the Nyakibale Hospital's 5-bed ER where GECC has trained emergency care providers. Of the 5 patients, one woman had a lung collapse, one man had a broken leg, one man had an ankle injury and 2 women had abdominal injuries. They were all given emergency care, and they all survived and are doing well. Here's what GECC's volunteer physician who was assisting the ECPs reported back:

"A few things about this night really stood out to me as remarkable:

Every patient received the appropriate care in a timely manner.
The ECPs worked really well together dividing the responsibilities.
The ED was calm and quiet. While there were many patients with potentially life-threatening injuries that would make me sweat, the ECPs had the situation under control The ED was so quiet that we realized we could still hear the Christian music playing off the research computer throughout the whole ordeal!
The ECPs are amazing!! Alfunsi, Irene, and Richard, after only 1 year of training are able to manage a critical and stressful situation. Jovita was a great leader. She allowed the ECPs to do their work, but she had a great overview of the whole situation. She was able to delegate duties and even directed the visiting doctors to the patients that needed some extra help.

At the end of the night we were all in awe of this amazing group of clinicians. They were poised, competent, and compassionate. This incident (among many others) made me feel really grateful and proud to be part of the GECC family!"

- Meera Muru, MD, GECC Volunteer Physician

Pre-hospital Training Program a Success!

In addition to this amazing story, GECC is proud to share with you news of the successful completion of its first Emergency First Responder training program! There is no 9-1-1 system in rural Uganda, no ambulances, and no paramedics. In order to improve emergency care prior to arrival to the hospital, local stakeholders and GECC collaborated to develop a training program for community and clinic health workers. These trainings were conducted in March and were well-received. We are confident that this training will help save even more lives by getting patients emergency care earlier and linking them to available resources!

Thank you again for your support of GECC's work and being part of the solution to improve emergency care where none exists. Please consider renewing your donation and spreading the word about our work to continue helping those who need it most!

Our sincere thanks,

The GECC team

GECC's training for community health workers

Training prehospital providers in emergency care

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Feb 13, 2013
ECP Graduation

By Stacey Chamberlain | GECC Co-founder

Valentine's Day is here! As you are thinking about your loved ones, we, at Global Emergency Care Collaborative, wanted to update you on the work that is so near and dear to our "hearts".

GECC is proud to announce the "graduation" of its newest six trainees! Alfunsi, Irene, Hillary, Richard, Serena, and Christine have graduated from the junior ("student") level to the senior ("teacher") level. To honor this achievement, they celebrated in a graduation ceremony in January. They will now solidify their new emergency care skills over the next year through clinical work and peer education. After they complete their senior year, they will become fully qualified Emergency Care Practitioners (ECPs), fully adept at independently diagnosing and treating emergency patients who desperately need their help!

The work these ECPs are doing is truly amazing. An 11 month old boy was seen in the Emergency Department in December with bloody diarrhea. One of the ECPs recognized that the child could have an emergency condition called "intussusception" which is a telescoping of the bowel. She did a bedside ultrasound and confirmed the diagnosis and got the child to surgery. One of the Ugandan doctors wrote us,

"What I find interesting is ECP's thought of the need for an abdominal ultra sound despite the absence of abdominal pain or distention. Without bed side ultrasound this boy could have been treated as a case of dysentery and would most likely deteriorate. Thanks for the great work in the ED"

Without the ECPs, this child would be another statistic, another one of the nearly 7 million children who needlessly died last year. But thanks to the ECPs, thanks to GECC, and THANKS TO YOU, his life was saved. Thank you again for being part of the solution, and please consider renewing your donation and spreading the word about our work to continue helping those who need it most!

Our sincere thanks,

The GECC team

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Nov 23, 2012
Global Emergency Care Collaborative providing life-saving care!

By Stacey Chamberlain | Vice President and Co-founder, GECC

ECP students learning suturing on pigs' feet

Happy Thanksgiving from GECC! During this time of thanks, we would like to thank all of our partners and donors for your support, and more importantly, the Emergency Care Practitioners (ECPs) we have trained and the patients we have helped thank you!

Due to your help, we are completing the training of six new ECPs who will be graduating in December. These ECPs will be able to independently care for acutely ill patients and themselves will become trainers for a new class to start in January. This train-the-trainer model has been highly effective and empowers the Ugandan ECPs to become not only clinicians but leaders and educators. Two of our Senior ECPs recently participated in an educational conference in Ghana, one of whom expressed her excitement in this text message to GECC, "Woow, thanks to GECC, I can't imagine...both acquiring knowledge at the same time having fun!! May you live to prosper in all."

These ECPs are truly providing essential care. Just last week, Maudu, a 32 year old woman, came to the Emergency Department complaining of abdominal pain and in shock. Christine, one of the ECP students, was able to do an ultrasound and diagnose her with a ruptured ectopic pregnancy (a pregancy in her fallopian tube that had burst and was causing life-threatening internal bleeding). She was quickly taken to the operating room for surgery to stop the bleeding and is now doing well. Without having an ECP to care for this patient, this young mother five would very possibly have died that day. So on this day of Thanksgiving, thanks for doing your part to save a life!

Please keep patients like Maudu in your thoughts during this holiday season, and consider contributing to this worthy cause. Together, we are making a difference!

From our GECC family to yours,

Happy Thanksgiving!

GECC's Program Director, ECPs, and GECC's Founder

ECPs treat trauma patients

Links:

GECC's website

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