Henry Farrar Memorial
Medical Clinic
The level of healthcare in many parts of Africa is very low as compared to world standards. Without a healthcare resource, the children of Susana Homes would not have a great chance of survival. Right Steps established the Henry Farrar Clinic as another component of the organization’s Christian holistic efforts in the area.
The Clinic provides health and psychological health services under which residents of Susana Homes as well as those from nearby communities come for counseling and other healthcare treatment not available from basic healthcare services. Healthcare is provided by two full-time registered nurses. Also, a physician from a local hospital visits the clinic monthly. This ministry is of primary importance as many children arrive undernourished, ill, or even abused. Each child receives a complete medical exam including testing for HIV/AIDS, and other contagious illnesses upon his/her entrance to the program. Then each child is monitored and evaluated and when needed, medical care is provided through the clinic in connection with the Nigerian Christian Hospital.
Primary healthcare is also provided to all of the children who attend the Right Steps Christian School in the form of daily vitamins, food supplements for at-risk children, and regularly scheduled checkups for skin diseases, childhood illnesses, and other primary health issues which occur. There is no charge for these services to the children.
In the near future, we have developed plans to employ a full or part-time physician who will live in the compound of Susana Homes. This will improve the quality and level of medical services significantly to the home as well as to the community. Currently, emergency health services are very difficult to obtain, due to our distance from the hospital.
Better health for rural children
Right Steps "Better Health for Rural Children" initiative ensures that a greater number of nursery and grade school children at Susana Homes and the surrounding villages benefit from daily intake of multivitamins and routine monthly malaria treatment to keep the children healthy in an otherwise malaria endemic zone of the world. All children of Susana Homes, those who attend Right Steps Christian Schools, and those who come to the Church of Christ at Susana Homes receive a multivitamin on a daily basis -- Monday through Friday -- if they only attend school and does not live at Susana Homes or attend Church at Susana Homes. Those who live at Susana Homes and attend church as well receive this 7 days a week and all through the year. They also get treated for malaria -- whether or not they are already sick on the first Friday of every month!
Come January 2017, this program will be extended to all of the children who attend the migrant school in the village of Umuahala. All children will also receive a glass of milk, one small ball of Akara (bean/pea cake), and a piece of fish for lunch. Right Steps, Inc. is excited about this addition -- and has high hopes that will help keep the children even healthier than they are today.
Right Steps, Inc. is very grateful to Brother Greg Williams of the Southside Church of Christ in Lexington, Kentucky who has for the last 5 years ensured that this program reaches all children who come in contact with Right Steps, Inc.
Plans for Prenatal Clinic
Nigeria currently accounts for 10% of worldwide maternal deaths and is the worst country in Africa at preventing vertical transmission of HIV (mother to child). Approximately 53,000 women and 250,000 newborns die each year in Nigeria due to mostly preventable causes. Basic prenatal care and emergent obstetric care in Nigeria are substandard and corrupt. Hospitals demand payment for services, require a husband to donate blood, and do not have consistent power supplies. Nigerian women often deliver in “spiritual churches” where traditional birth attendants use incantations, herbal treatments, and special soaps as their main methods of delivery.
Right Steps is currently developing a prenatal clinic to provide education, counseling and non-emergent medical care to pregnant Nigerian women. We hope to counter the prevalent superstitions, provide incentives for completing basic prenatal care and hospital delivery, and address the financial burden of hospital care.
Land across the street from the main entrance to the Susana Homes compound has been purchased as a site for the prenatal clinic. We are currently seeking additional funding to build, supply, and staff the clinic. Hopefully soon our supporters will be able to sponsor a local pregnant woman’s prenatal care and greatly improve the health of both mother and child.
