We are traveling to Kenya on behalf of the nonprofit Saving Mothers. We will be going with a group of medical professionals to provide gynecologic and urological surgical training and a clinic to the region of Kenya that we have worked with for years. We have a program director at this hospital and have not been able to go back since before COVID.
The community of West Pokot, Kenya and surrounding areas. It is an area of low-resources and inaccessibility to complex urogynecological surgery.
The health professionals at the hospital will carry forward the trainings the learn with the supplies we are gathering to donate.
In addition to performing 30+ gynecological surgeries for women in West Pokot, our fall trip to Kenya was impactful because we got to see our traditional birth attendant training (TBA) program in-action. Originally derived in Guatemala, our TBA training program was piloted in West Pokot this fall in order to help reduce the maternal mortality rate in the region through increased provider education. Our three-month course trains local traditional birth attendants in obstetrics and basic healthcare, and we graduated 6 attendants this fall. We will be expanding the program in 2023 to include more TBAs, and the course will be led by a local graduate. Throughout the training program, our traditional birth attendants drastically improved their knowledge (as measured through written and practical examinations), and, most importantly, became empowered to educate other traditional birth attendants in their communities.
