A Registered Nurse ’s Dispatch from Uganda

April 03, 2018In honor of World Health Worker Week 2018, health workers from around the world are telling us what it ' s really like on the front lines.This week, we ’re featuring personal stories from frontline health workers all over the world. It’s just one of the ways we’re celebratingWorld Health Worker Week 2018.Today ’s post featuresSamalie Kitoleko, a registered nurse who ’s using her story to advocate for policy changes that help the people in her community and in others like it.A registered nurse in UgandaOne day I went to a community to look for a young girl who was nine years —she had heart disease and had not come to the hospital to follow up.When I found her parents, they told me they did not feel that medicine would help her. They were just waiting for her to die.So I shared with them the story of a patient, a little girl whom I lost simply because she was not coming for follow-up and her family did not have the information they needed.The girl ’s parents were touched, and sent her back for her medication. We got her a sponsorship for open-heart surgery, and she was operated on, and now she is doing fine.When I shared my story of the little girl I lost with the administrators where I work, they began to see that these patients often don ’t have enough information. I tell them I need time to go out and teach these patients what they need to know. Because the information we read in books regarding diseases, it ' s not for us. It ’s for the patie...
Source: IntraHealth International - Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: Source Type: news