Medical Camps

Hi, my name is Ben and I want to tell you a story. I am in Kenya with a bunch of extremely vibrant, enthusiastic and caring people. When you come to Kenya you are confronted with many challenges. One of those challenges is the process of deciding where or what to put your time, energy and money into. The fantastic crew over here at the moment (Jemma, Cara, Josh, Lucy, Rachael, Will, Nicole, Karen and myself) contribute to many different placements throughout the week, but there is one thing we are unified in and that is Medical Camps. Medical camps occur once a week with a final revisit two weeks later. In conjunction with the North Gem Community Resource Centre we decide on a rural community that needs our help. Word travels to the community and they gather their troops. We gather our funds, resources, medical supplies and hire professional health care workers. It is time to make a difference! So some of you may be asking yourself, gee that sounds great, but what is a medical camp? Good question. The medical camps are aimed at treating jiggers, skin diseases, de-worming children and providing vitamins and minerals. One of the greatest issues facing the rural communities in Western Kenya is jiggers. Jiggers (Chigoe Flea) are parasites that live in loose soil and feed on warm-blooded hosts (humans). As many Kenyan’s in this region live on day to day necessities, they simply cannot afford foot wear. This allows the jiggers to penetrate and burrow into the foot, usually around the toe region. The jiggers cause immense pain, infection and they rapidly eat away at the flesh of the foot. This creates an enormous problem because if left untreated, the victim can become debilitated and unable to walk. It is not uncommon to see jigger damage in the hands and elbows of victims, spread by the excruciating itching. We treat the jiggers by bathing and cleaning the infected areas in diluted Eusol, which eradicates the parasites. This is the most painful part as you need to scrub the infected site very thoroughly. We then disinfect the area with Dettol to eliminate the infection and finally apply Betadine. A simple and effective treatment, however, it is so far out of reach for many locals. Jiggers die within a week, and then upon our return visit, we cut off the dead flesh and complete another treatment. Many children in the region also have intestinal worms which affects their cognitive ability and general health. We provide them with a deworming tablet and a follow up tablet upon our revisit. We treat the skin diseases such as scabies with a broad-spectrum anti-fungal cream and administer everyone with multi vitamins to help boost their immune system in this time of treatment. We spray infected ground sites to help exterminate the jiggers and educate the community on jigger prevention and basic hygiene. In exchange for a smile, candy and cordial are also given out. We have so far completed 3 medical camps with 2 revisits and on average treat approx 300 people each camp. A big thank you to all that have donated funding towards the medical camps. Without you this would not be possible. The camps have really opened our eyes to some of the incredibly harsh issues facing the Kenyan people. Although extremely heartbreaking, the camps are also rewarding as the communities are very thankful for our help and we feel we are really making a difference.