Village medical healthcare promoted

There are 256 medical staff, including 52 village health care providers, in Khanh Vinh District. In spite of challenging trails in the mountainous area and local residents’ limited knowledge, village medical staff have made great effort to provide primary healthcare for locals.

Village medical staff check mosquito larval habitats at some families in Khanh Vinh.

 

Cao Thi Hue, Hon Du Village, Khanh Nam Commune, says she did not get sufficient nutrition during her pregnancy. Her baby, weighing only 2.4kg at birth, was undernourished and got sick after 1 month. She did not know how to take good care of her newborn baby. She is so grateful that village health care providers pay a home visit every week to take care of her baby and family.

 

“Thanks to the medical staff’s regular home visits, I become more aware of dengue control and prevention. I learn that mosquitoes are primary malaria and dengue vectors and thus we should tidy up our house regularly, clean and rinse water jars, sleep in a mosquito nets, etc to protect ourselves from getting the disease,” says Cao Thi Nghiem, Khanh Trung Commune.

 

Over 18 years working in the village heath care, Dang Thi Thuy, Hon Du Village, Khanh Nam Commune, has known very clearly about local residents' health status. She regularly pays visit to every family to  inform of vaccination and vitamin A supplementation schedules for kids under 5 and epidemic prevention. “We felt the job difficult and discouraging at first. When sick, ethnic minority don’t often seek doctors. We have to explain to them many times, day by day, and they gradually become more aware of proper healthcare and disease prevention,” says Dang Thi Thuy.

 

“Locals used to prescribe their own treatment and medication instead of seeking doctors’ advice. Thanks to the medical staff’s effort, the problem has much improved,” reports Nguyen Hung Hoang, Head of Khanh Vinh District Healthcare Division.

 

Vaccination rate among children in Khanh Vinh District is currently more than 90%. The malnutrition rate among kids under 5 has decreased considerably. In 2015 alone, the vaccination rate was over 95% and malnutrition rate among kids under 5 was 30.8%. In the first 8 months of 2016, undernourished children were down to 29.7% and malaria cases down by 34% compared with  the same period last year. However, higher pay for village medial workers is needed to further promote their roles in local healthcare.

 

B.N

Translated by N.T