Health education with creativity

  I needed a wide bore cannula to relieve the pneumothorax but the place was a bank not a hospital!, I had to think fast and improvise. I had a penknife in my bag. I always carried it with me just in case . I located his second intercostal   along the midclavicular   line and made   an incision there into his chest cavity. The trapped air rushed out like gas coming out of a bottle of Coca Cola that has been   shaken vigorously before being opened. It stopped as sooner as I pulled the knife out. This was expected, I needed something to keep the hole open, ideally   a chest tube with an underwater seal. A pen top could do the job too, in this dire circumstance. I grabbed a pen top from one of the numerous ‘chained pens’ in the bank. I jabbed it into the hole and the air rushed out   till his left lung expanded enough to enable him breath with minimal difficulty. The next thing was to stop the bleeding. I had no bandages for that, hence one of his comrade...

  ABCD... in the bank. My phone rang at 12AM that day. I was in that stage of sleep where reality was dreamlike and  dreams  were tangible  and real. The sustained ringing of the phone jerked me out of my sweet dreams and  shook me out of its intoxicating effects. It was my  sister. She  skipped the salutations and blurted into my ear ,’ I  need 15000  immediately, my life depends on it!’. I wanted to ask her what the emergency was but she was too busy shouting instructions on how I could get the money to her with lightening speed . I did not have that amount of money on me at that time. I never kept that much money on me just in case I ever  got robbed. I was always  sober and vigilant. I always took all the necessary precautions to prevent myself from getting robbed and I had been successful so far, but that day my luck run out. I got to the International Technical Bank early in the morning at  exactly 8:30am. I was the...

Sickle Cell Disease Sickle Cell Disease is a group of hereditary blood disordrs affecting Red Blood Cells, with high morbidity and death rates. There are different types of sickle cell disease including sickle cell hemoglobin C (SC) disease, sickle cell hemoglobin D (SD) disease, and sickle cell beta-thalassemia which are less severe forms of sickle cell disease. Sickle cell anemia is a more severe form. According to World Health Organization, it is the most prevalent genetic disease in the WHO African Region. In many countries, 10%–40% of the population carries the sickle-cell gene resulting in estimated SCD prevalence of at least 2%. Normal Red Blood Cells are biconcave discs and are pliable or flexible which enables them deform without rupturing and squeeze through narrow blood capillaries. Red Blood Cells live up to about one hundred and twenty (120) days after which they are destroyed by macrophages in the spleen, liver or red bone marrow and their components recycled to ...

Female Reproductive Health: Menstrual Hygiene Management #menstrualhygieneday #28thMay ‘Menstrual Hygiene Management (MHM) is defined as ‘Women and adolescent girls using a clean menstrual management material to absorb or collect blood that can be changed in privacy as often as necessary for the duration of the menstruation period, using soap and water for washing the body as required, and having access to facilities to dispose off used menstrual management materials’. (JMP,2012) The Challenge Menstrual hygiene management is a problem for most menstruating girls and women globally, especially in low-income countries. Poor menstrual hygiene management can have adverse effect on girls and women including low self esteem, shame, stigma, stress and not forgetting the various health challenges. Some of the challenges girls and women face are inadequate WASH (water, sanitation and hygiene) facilities, lack of social support, inadequate education and inability to access menstrual ...

The ‘yellow babies’ day Jaundice affects about 50% of term babies and 80% of preterm babies. Globally over 100,000 late-preterm and term babies die each year from  jaundice. To achieve the targets of the second goal of the  SDGs  widespread public education must be undertaken on neonatal jaundice. The stifling heat of the NICU was exceptionally intense that day. Sweat poured down my face , my neck and into my  clothes. My glasses kept slipping down my nose. My singlet was totally drenched in sweat and my yellow shirt was going to follow suit if I did not get the iv access  for the jaundiced baby in the next two minutes.I held my breath to increase my accuracy  as I inserted the iv cannula  into the baby’s arm for the tenth time, but my hand shifted slightly and I missed the vein when a nurse blurted out my name that another baby with jaundice had arrived and was having seizures. “Apart from your yellow shirt you must be wearing yell...

Female Reproductive Health: The Reproductive Cycle In many parts of the world and in some religions today, the topic of menstruation is seen as a taboo, surrounded by silence and shrouded in myths. Many parents hardly discuss the topic with their young girls and women are ashamed talking about their reproductive and menstrual health; but this process is part of our lives and is absolutely normal! In fact, menstruation or a period occurs approximately four hundred and fifty times during a woman’s lifetime. Menstruation is a normal biological process and it shows that we are women. It should be celebrated everyday and not hidden in shame and disgust. It is therefore important that we understand how our bodies work and how this cycle unfolds. The reproductive cycle  also known as the menstrual cycle refers to the regular cyclical changes that occur in the ovaries and uterus making reproduction possible. It consists of two concurrent processes; the ovarian cycle which involves the...