School of Nursing and Midwifery

International

Ghana

International Diversity

Queen's visit to Ghana in 2003

Queen’s University Belfast School of Nursing and Midwifery Lecturers Dale Spence and Una Lynch along with Research Assistant Jenny McNeill joined up with Professor Leda Mc Kendry and team from Amherst University, Boston and San Francisco, USA to work with the Ghana International Health Mission, a Primary Health Care Project in Sekondi, Ghana. This was the second time that the School has participated in this project: Queen’s School of Nursing and Midwifery Lecturer Orla McAlinden paved the way in 2001.

The QUB team's primary focus on the trip was maternal and child health. In addition to time spent working with the Ghana International Health Mission the team spent time working with local health initiatives run by community health workers and local nurses. Most women in Ghana have their babies alone at home and as a result time was also spent with traditional birth attendants in the community and in birthing centres.

As midwives linked with the School of Nursing and Midwifery at Queen's University Belfast, Jenny and Dale were delighted to have the opportunity to experience midwifery first hand. The Principal Nursing Officer for Public Health for the region was most accommodating and facilitated visits to the local clinic/hospital. Interviews were also set up with one of the local traditional birth attendants and a retired independent midwife. The two midwives found it amazing to actually meet and share experiences with those from a different culture.

Dale and Jenny spent time with the director of public health nursing and maternity services in the district, visited a number of maternity services including a local birthing centre and spent time with local traditional birth attendants. Jenny also spent a day working at an outreach clinic based at a local chieftain's palace (an indoor toilet made it different from the other residents in the area), the poverty and deprivation witnessed in Sekondi was even more extreme in this area. The poignancy of life for the community is embodied in the story of a 10 year-old boy. Having queued from the previous night, his family desperate for help, the child was the first patient Jenny saw that morning. He had been ill with a fever and convulsions for over two days and was clearly in the advanced stages of meningitis: transferred to hospital he died a few hours later.

Life in Ghana is hard and rarely does one see a woman walking without a load of some description: children, water, fruit, cloth, fish, etc. Dale and Jenny spent time with the director of public health nursing and maternity services in the district, visited a number of maternity services including a local birthing centre and spent time with local traditional birth attendants. Jenny also spent a day working at an outreach clinic based at a local chieftain's palace (an indoor toilet made it different from the other residents in the area), the poverty and deprivation witnessed in Sekondi was even more extreme in this area.

The poignancy of life for the community is embodied in the story of a 10 year-old boy. Having queued from the previous night, his family desperate for help, the child was the first patient Jenny saw that morning. He had been ill with a fever and convulsions for over two days and was clearly in the advanced stages of meningitis: transferred to hospital he died a few hours later.

Reflecting the Queen's public health priorities for the visit, Una joined with Julia and Sabrina (public health students from San Francisco, USA) to work with local groups of children and adults to explore what health meant within a Ghanian context and to strengthen the capacity for health promotion locally.