Through the Pharmacy Window

May 19, 2017Meet Elina Nantinda, one of a new generation of health workers who are turning the tide of Namibia ’s HIV epidemic.“When I was in grade 8, I was into two things: fashion and medicine,” says Elina Nantinda, a 25-year-old pharmacy assistant in rural Namibia. “So I decided to study hard. I thought, ‘It would be so nice to work with medicine and to know more about yourself and how medicine works in your body .’”Today she runs the pharmacy at Omuthiya District Hospital ’s HIV clinic in northern Namibia, dispensing antiretroviral medicines to a hundred clients per day, on average. People come from miles around—most on foot—for HIV services at Omuthiya. And most come to see Elina at some point.Being alone, you learn more and faster.When she started this job at Omuthiya last year, Elina spent two days working with a senior pharmacist. But then that person was moved to the main clinic, and she ’s been on her own ever since.“Being alone, you learn more and faster,” Elina says. “But we need another person in our pharmacy, so that when one is dispensing the medications, the other is entering data into the computer.”Like all the other health workers at Omuthiya, Elina is constantly busy. Yet she ’s always on the watch for clients who look lost or in need of help, and her watchfulness helps the whole clinic run more smoothly.“I watch their facial expressions,” Elina says, particularly those of clients who come to pick up their medications—a...
Source: IntraHealth International - Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: Source Type: news