A Ray of Hope

Since working here we have, at times, been saddened, distressed and frustrated by the scale of the poverty and the hugely stretched medical resources for such a massive population. This week we spent a day in the Community Health Clinic linked to the Hospital, and were really encouraged about  the amazing work that is going on to start to combat these problems.

The clinic is in a place called Sundan Nagri, on the outskirts of Delhi, which is a pretty poor area. It has been running for over thirty years and has a full time team of doctors working there. It is funded by the hospital, which spends 10% of its annual budget on the clinic so that all the services it offers are free to the people who use it. It just serves the people in this area, which numbers about 70,000. However, it is so much more than just a health clinic.

On the health side of things, it runs a drop in service where patients can come with any current problems. They are seen, briefly examined, and if needed prescribed medication which they can collect there for free. If it is anything that needs further investigation they will be referred to a government hospital (which is free), or sometimes to our hospital, but their socioeconomic status will be assessed and if they can't afford it, the hospital will still give them the treatment for free. There are also follow up clinics for those with ongoing problems such as diabetes and high blood pressure, as well as reproduction clinics educating newly married couples in contraception.  Vaccinations are also provided free of charge for all the local children.

They also run several services for children. There is a crèche which looks after pre-school aged children who are orphaned or malnourished or whose parents aren't coping. Here they are looked after and fed nutritious meals. As the schooling these children receive is often quite poor, they have a child to child education scheme whereby high school aged children teach the younger ones to enhance their education. They also teach young women to make and tailor their own clothes, equipping them with sustainable skills, and taught people how to use computers - a very employable skill.

Further to all this, there is a kitchen on site which is independently run by some local woman who run it as a business. The hospital contracts them to provide the meals, and they add to this income by grinding up and selling spices. Along similar lines of empowering women there are also self defence classes for girls that are held there.

We were told that this is the only clinic of its kind linked to a private hospital - there are government funded ones around, but they are less well equipped. This is such a brilliant idea - more of these are really needed.

We spent the day sitting in with the doctors and seeing how it all worked. The clinics were pretty busy, and the place buzzing with activity. In the afternoon we went out with the mobile clinic to a homeless community within Delhi. This happens twice a day and they cover 15-20 homeless communities across the whole city by doing this. The one we went to today was under a metro bridge and the homes were constructed out of bits of fabric and tarpaulin strung up. About 300 people lived there, and the level of poverty was quite shocking. As soon as the van pulled up crowds gathered around, but there was soon an orderly system. People would come up to the window of the van, describe their symptoms and the doctor would write down their name and the drugs they would need. Whilst someone got these ready, the patient went round to the back door of the van to collect them. We got through over 70 patients while we were there, each consultation lasting less than a minute, but providing precious medicines to people who may otherwise have no contact with health care. We also collected the fingerprints of each patient, as a form of identification, as part of the paperwork which has to be submitted to the government and the NGOs which fund all this free medication.

We created great excitement amongst the children who soon spotted two white people in the van and went to get their friends to have a look! A game soon broke out of looking at us until we grinned at them, at which point they would break into fits of giggles and run out of sight, before returning a minute later to do all this again! This of course soon evolved into us waving and pulling faces at them, much to the amusement of the parents queuing up at the van!

It was so encouraging and amazing to see just how much work this hospital does outside of the hospital for some of the most vulnerable and needy members of society. It's a huge challenge, but this is surely a brilliant way to begin to tackle it. 

The pink sun setting behind our Hospital in Delhi.