Health Care

 

Nueva Vida Clinic

What started 20+ years ago in Nicaragua, with visiting U.S. doctors and nurses seeing patients in tents and prescribing medicines out of trunks, has grown into a health clinic offering a full range of services to patients five days a week. Our clinic is located in a barrio of Ciudad Sandino, named Nueva Vida (meaning New Life). The Nueva Vida barrio was founded in 1998 when 12,000 flood refugees were moved onto two cow pastures after Hurricane Mitch, the most deadly hurricane of the 20th century. Besides serving these residents, the Nueva Vida Clinic receives patients from Ciudad Sandino and surrounding rural communities (pop. 180,000).

 

The Nueva Vida Clinic is open from 8-5, Monday-Friday. Its services are broken down into six main areas:

 

Medical Care

  • Including the part-time services of a pediatrician, a general physician, and the full-time services of a radiologist; a laboratory; a pharmacy; and home visits for the elderly and patients at risk.

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Dental Care

  • Including a full time dentist, hygienist, and dental assistant. Besides being the only low-cost or free dental clinic for a city of 180,000 people, the clinic’s dental care has a special focus on reaching children from feeding centers in Nueva Vida.

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Women’s Care

  • Includes family planning; prevention and early detection of cervical cancer; limited medical care; and several support groups for pregnant women, moms and babies, moms and toddlers, as well as one for preteen and teen girls to combat teen pregnancy.

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Public Health

  • Education and support – including classes on sexual health, HIV/AIDS, asthma, mental and emotional issues, type 2 diabetes, hypertension, and nutrition. On staff is a health promoter and volunteering are 30 lay health promoters organized to work in the community

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Vision Health

  • The CDCA provides vision checks and donated glasses if needed. Also the clinic shapes pre-ground lenses to fit new frames that look a little more modern and match prescription needs better than once-worn donated glasses.

 
 

Therapy Care

  • Including support groups, individual sessions and in-school trainings by a psychologist.

The clinic staff feels strongly that the more patients learn about their own bodies and the bodies of their children, the more control they have over their own health. But because the clinic is located in an impoverished neighborhood, outside donations are needed to keep the clinic operating. In an effort to make the CDCA’s health care program more sustainable over time, the CDCA’s staff is hoping to create an endowment for the Nueva Vida Clinic.