News Archive - September 2003

NEWSLETTER
from
Dr Catherine Hamlin AC
Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital, Ethiopia
September 2003

Dear Friends,

It is our rainy season here, so we all feel rather low in spirits, because of the cold wet days and the mud and slush everywhere.

As an Australian, I think, I feel it more than others. The Ethiopians take it all in their stride, and never complain!

The wet season continues from Mid-June to Mid-September! In spite of this, patient numbers arriving have not changed much, usually there are fewer in the wet season, but not so this year. So we still have a shortage of beds.

Building the new 30-bed hostel/ward
We look forward to very soon being able to start building our new 30-bed waiting ward on the land adjoining the Hospital. Mr. Varnero, our good builder (the best in Ethiopia we think), has agreed to build it for us. At the same time he is going to improve the steep part of the land running down to the river, perhaps terracing and levelling it, so that one day we can build there if needed.

The new hostel will be on the upper gentle slopes of the land, but once built, it would be difficult to bi-pass the building with bulldozers etc. to develop the lower section. So we hope we can finance this all together!

The new "Outreach" Centres
You will have read that we plan to try and build a "fistula" ward associated with the Provincial hospitals in five towns in Ethiopia. The towns are Mekelle, Bahr Dar, Harer, Metu and Yirgalem. This will be part of our "outreach" program.

At Bahr Dar
Mr. Varnero, our builder, has raised money to help build the "fistula" ward at our Bahr Dar Outreach Centre, near Lake Tana. The money is being given through the "Knights of Malta". Years ago this ancient body had an Embassy in Ethiopia. Reg and I once went to a dinner at their Embassy, where the romance and antiquity of the past touched us! The Embassy left long ago, but Mr. Varnero is still in touch with them. He has raised this money through them, and has himself, agreed to build the Centre free for us, in memory of his father. So this ward in Bahr Dar will be built and established at no cost to us!

Dr Ambaye has been to Bahr Dar to choose the site and selected a good area in the quite extensive grounds of this Provincial Hospital. The doctors there are excited and will work with us.

At Yirgalem
Another Centre in Yirgalem is also going to be built at no cost to us, by The Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (NORAD). Originally the Yirgalem Hospital was a Norwegian Lutheran Mission Hospital, now it is part government as well.

Finance for a third "fistula" ward.
Financial Aid has also been promised for a third centre by an American Charity AMDD. (Averting Maternal Death and Disability).

All this has given us enormous encouragement, and our hearts are uplifted to our loving and wonderful God, who has provided and sustained us all these years and now for this new venture!

We are very thankful for all the support that we continue to have from Australia, and for help that comes from support groups in other parts of the world, that have been set up solely to help us.

Financial Aid from overseas
Our oldest "fund raisers" are in the UK - The Hamlin Churchill Childbirth Injuries Fund. Clive Hewitt, the Treasurer of the UK Trust, is here with us as I write this letter. He has been a faithful supporter and friend of our hospital for many years. He retired early from his prosperous Accountancy Firm in order to devote his life to help these poor patients.

He comes regularly on visits to discuss financial matters with us, especially with our Finance Manager, Mrs Genet Kifle. His advice and wisdom is greatly appreciated. Sometimes his wife Dorothy comes with him usually laden with things for our hospital. Their Methodist Church has a Women's sewing group. They made a large number of colourful knitted shawls, which are greatly appreciated by the patients! You have probably seen pictures of the girls wearing these as they walk about. In the cold wet weather we have been having, the shawls help keep them warm!

Our newest "fund-raiser" is in America. It is The American Friends Foundation for Childbirth Injuries Fund (now known as The Fistula Foundation - Ed). The Fistula Foundation was set up by Ric Haas, another man who is dedicated to help the Fistula Hospital. He is organising a trip I am making, in October, to America. Ruth Kennedy is going with me!

The reason for this trip is that I am being awarded a Fellowship from the American College of Surgeons. It is quite undeserved I feel, but an honour really for all our staff.

It is also an opportunity for me, while I am there, to try and raise money and make the public of that great land, aware of this need!

Ric has been tireless in organising meetings and dinners with wealthy people in New York and in the Washington area, before we fly to Chicago to receive this Award.

Perhaps in another later newsletter I may have good news, if we can touch hearts of people there, and if I can carry out this daunting task with God's help.

I am thankful Ruth Kennedy will be with me! She is such a support and has a succinct way of presenting facts so clearly.

Sweden's Fistula Hospital Foundation
I must mention too, the great support we have had from a Swedish Trust set up many years ago by a group of Swedish women members of Parliament.

Ethiopia has for a long time, had links with Sweden and support from this country goes back even as far as the 19th century!

So this tradition has continued and the Fistula Hospital, as a result, has benefited.

The Swedish Foundation sends regular sums of money to supplement our Ethiopian doctors' rather meagre salaries!

Also they contact SIDA on our behalf - (Swedish Government aid for Developing Countries), and through this appeal raise money to help with our running costs.

Substantial increase in running costs
Our running costs have greatly increased with rising costs of living, and with our constantly expanding work. With the improved hospital facilities (funded mainly from Australia), the X-ray, the Physiotherapy and the pathology units, and now with Desta Mender more staff have been employed, and more expenses are incurred.

Clive Hewitt has produced figures to show that our running costs have increased 100% over the last 5 years.

This sounds alarming but we are very fortunate that two great organisations have helped with our annual running costs, World Vision and Ethiopiaid. They have helped to keep our hospital open and functioning, and then we have generous people and organisations such as Rotary, Inner Wheel, Zonta Clubs and many individuals who give us gifts in kind, as well as financial support.

Financial support for future years
Our financial advisers are pressing that we should try and build up some kind of investment portfolio, so that interest from investments will ensure that we have enough income to assist with the running costs in the future.

Some people have made the Hospital a beneficiary in their Will. This type of gift will really help in this regard.

I hope that this has not been a boring newsletter, but I feel you should hear and know that we have on the one hand, increased financial expenditure, and on the other hand, increased support Internationally.

In every way, we are thankful for the people who through their gifts display the compassion of God toward women so terribly and tragically injured, and enabling us to give them back a life they can enjoy!

Thank you again, for all your wonderful support. Desta Mender owes its existence to you and now also our new 30-bed ward will be your gift for many, many more patients.

I am sending a photo of Minte who is now cured and happy. Her story was in the last newsletter. She is now living at Desta Mender, where we hardly recognise her as the same girl; she has put on weight and is so healthy.

My work here continues to give me enormous joy, much due to the dedicated and wonderful staff that work together to make this hospital a home, a haven, and a place where I believe the spirit of God is at work.

With my love to you all,

Dr Catherine Hamlin AC

Wossena Tigella
Wossena is only 17, perhaps even younger, and recently arrived at the Hospital. She was desperately thin and weak, but was happy in the knowledge that help was available for her.

She was married 3 years ago. Then about 18 months later became pregnant. When the time came for her to have her baby she was at home and spent the first three days of her labour in her small hut with her mother. On the fourth day she left to go and find help. It was fortunate that she lived close to a town called Desse, to the north of Addis Ababa.

With the help of forceps she delivered a stillborn child. By this time she was so weak and ill that she slipped into a coma. The Desse hospital kept her, barely alive, for the next 3 weeks. Then, she was carried home where it took another 3 months before she could walk. When eventually, she was strong enough, she made the journey with her mother to the Fistula hospital in Addis Ababa. The Desse hospital had told her about the Hospital and her mother brought her.

Wossena's husband, when he discovered the offensive nature of her problem, left her.

When she arrived at the Fistula Hospital, it was evident that she had dreadful injuries. Her birth canal was almost all destroyed, she only had half of her bladder left, and a large fistula into her rectum. She underwent a lengthy operation and is now almost totally normal again.

Wossena is still very thin, but gaining weight. She is happy at the Hospital, and has made a lot of friends. She has put her time in Hospital to good use, by crocheting a shawl.

Dr Andrew Browning's visits to Uganda
Earlier this year, in March, Dr Andrew Browning accompanied Dr Brian Hancock to Uganda to perform fistula surgery there. Dr Hancock is a member of the English "Hamlin" Trust, and also visits the Fistula Hospital occasionally. He does some of the difficult surgical cases.

Andrew was able to work with Dr Hancock in central Uganda. Together they operated on 20 women and trained local nursing staff.

Dr Hancock has been going regularly to Uganda for several years, and has set up a fistula program whereby other doctors come and do "fistula camps". The training is in 3 different hospitals in the country, for a few weeks at a time.

It is intended that Andrew will be returning to Uganda in September. Dr Hancock, unfortunately, is not able to go to Uganda this time because he has had to have surgery, himself. Thankfully he is recovering well.

The doctor that will accompany Andrew, this time, is one of the world's top urogynaecologist, Dr Monga from the UK. Dr Mongo wants to have more experience with fistula surgery and to help with the Uganda program, in the future.

On this trip they will return to one of the camps at Lira in Central Uganda, where a number of patients are already waiting to see them.

The Mercy Ships
In May Dr Andrew Browning, with the help of Mamite, travelled to Togo in West Africa to work from the Mercy Ship "Ananstasis" and perform fistula surgery on patients that had been brought to the Mercy ship.

Dr Biruk from the Fistula Hospital had earlier worked on the "Ananstasis" in 2001.

The Mercy Ships are operated by a Christian Organisation. They have three ships which are "floating hospitals" going from port to port along the west coast of Africa and beyond. They provide surgery that isn't available in the countries they visit.

The "fistula program" is a more recent addition to their service, and of cause the Fistula Hospital is giving support to it. Dr Brian Hancock and Dr John Kelly from the English Hamlin Trust have also volunteered to help this program.

Both Andrew and Mamite had a most worthwhile time. All the patients they operated on were cured!

One woman had had her fistula for 7 years...

"She thought that she was the only woman in the world with her condition."