Two faculty and eight nursing students/recent nursing grads from Hannibal-LaGrange University in Hannibal, MO have arrived to work in Cercadillo this week. Today’s lessons with children focused on the importance of washing hands.
With a song, coloring pages and “hands-on” 🙂 learning opportunities, the HLGU students did a great job of teaching our children.
By the end of the week we hope to have several women in the village trained in taking basic vital signs. Today’s lesson for the “Ayudantes de Salud” (Health Helpers) focused on taking temperatures, reading a chart to know when the temperature is low, normal, high or very high and what appropriate actions are for each level.
The village women took turns taking each other’s temperatures. The hardest part of the lesson for several of our women was not taking the temperature, reading the chart or cleaning the thermometer. The hardest part was not laughing and thus, not being able to keep their mouths closed long enough for a good reading. 🙂
I would imagine that the majority of you who read this have a thermometer in your home. I would imagine that the majority of you have at one time or another taken the temperature of a sick child, or your own temperature. For my women this was an exciting and empowering experience. Equipped with some thermometers that will be shared by the Ayudantes de Salud, wiser decisions can be made concerning when additional medical help should be sought and when a cold bath might be sufficient.
A women’s health workshop was offered after the Ayudantes de Salud training. It was very well received with much lively discussion. The Cercadillo women expressed great enthusiasm to be learning such practical skills and gaining information concerning how they can be pro-active in the health of themselves and their families.
And this was just the first day!
