The Heart of the Work: Health Promoters
Left: Becca & health promoter Silvio weighing babies in 1999; Right: Silvio doing patient home visits 2024.
“My name is Silvio, I’ve been a health promoter for 25 years.”
“My name is Nora, I’ve been a health promoter in the rural areas for thirty years.”
“My name is Scarleth, I’ve been a health promoter for 12 years.”
“My name is Adolfo, I must be the baby of the group, I’ve only been here for a year and a half!”
“My name is Maryellis, I just started as a health promoter today.”
The 30 Nueva Vida Clinic lay health promoters are in their monthly meeting with clinic health promoter Haydee, volunteer Dr. Cassie Iutzi and new clinic volunteer Tim Ryan.
Cassie showing proper feet inspection for diabetic patients.
“I’ve been coming to volunteer in this clinic for 20 years,” says Cassie. “And today I’m here to talk about wound care and diabetic feet. I was looking over your reports for the last three months and it looks like you all do a lot of wound care, is that right?”
There are nods all around the room – the promoters see 400 patients in their homes monthly and average 60 wound care sessions each month. Cassie shows a slide of a nasty foot wound.
“Who has seen this type of wound before?” Half the group raises their hands and several say, “I’ve seen worse!”
Cassie goes through how to prevent wounds – proper nail care, washing and drying – treatment for different wounds and when to send someone to the clinic or the hospital.
Cassie describing proper nail care.
“Most importantly, we need to catch wounds before they get bad, which means that we need to check our diabetic patients’ feet every time we do a home visit.”
The health promoters pair up and check each other’s feet. There are lots of jokes and giggling, and not a few impromptu foot massages for fellow promoters. Cassie makes her way around, chatting and conferring with the promoters.
Zaida and Maryellis examining feet during training.
We have a number of new health promoters – several of our older promoters have become too ill to keep up with the work, and younger promoters are joining the ranks. They are not shy, jumping right in to learn and share comfortably. This group exudes caring and welcoming vibes – together they have learned everything from CPR and injections to reiki to conflict resolution.
They live in different parts of Nueva Vida – we have several promoters in each etapa or area – and also the rural villages. They do patient home visits as well as keeping first aid kits in their homes to do wound care and treat common ailments such as allergies and colds. They help bring in patients for health fairs and keep patients flowing in an efficient fashion during the fairs when we see 400 people in one day.
The health promoters are the clinic’s ambassadors in the community – talking to their neighbors about programs, special attention, and referring patients who are ill. They are also the community’s ambassadors to the clinic – sharing the community’s struggles and needs with the clinic, and helping ensure patients get the care they need most. The depth of empathy and care they show patients never fails to impress me.
Rebeca and Francisco David examining feet during training.
Cassie concludes the training by asking what they want to the training to cover next month – sexual health and family planning is the most popular request. That decided, the promoters make their way to the pharmacy to receive first aid supplies and a small ayuda which helps cover their transport cost for coming to the meeting and other activities. As I wave goodbye, I realize that these amazing health promoters are not only the heart of the clinic, but of our community work overall – they are invaluable.
- Becca
This invaluable program needs your help to continue! The JHC-CDCA is has just concluded a visioning process for the next 5 years and to jump start that work, during September we our goal is to raise $50,000. You can help through a recurring monthly donation or a one-time donation here. Find out more about our campaign here.