The Sumba Foundation

Home » Community Development Program » 2009 Community Development Projects » Health » Primary Care

Primary Care

Below are the projects we have begun to undertake, or hope to soon; here’s how you can help:

Sponsor a Doctor for the Community

Our health projects are now covering an area of approximately 60 square miles (96 square kilometers). We operate five clinics and are providing for the health needs of a population of about 20,000 Sumbanese who are living in 400 villages.

We started our medical aid program in 2002 with the help of an American medical student. In the following years short term volunteer medical professionals assisted in the continued development and expansion of our health programs. As we grew it was clear that we needed volunteers who could give us long term commitments to train and improve the skills of our nurses. These volunteers were able to make great improvements but were hindered by the language barrier.

Now we have hired our in house medical doctor and in so doing we have reached another milestone in the ongoing growth of our health programs. With our success comes a responsibility to the community for us to provide the best medical care possible. In the early years we were dealing with minor medical issues that over time became more complex. Now that our reputation is so high in the community people are coming to us with medical problems that our beyond our nursing staffs abilities to help and were faced with turning patients away.

This year it was time to have a permanent doctor working with us. Accurate diagnosis and treatment are essential to properly meet the needs of the community. There is also the continuing need to train and improve the skills of our nurses and for the management of our five clinics.

The doctor is rotating daily to our clinics throughout the week and is on call to deal with medical emergencies at all times, wherever they are. In so doing we have no doubt that our healthcare system is able to provide the absolute best there is on the island.

Provide a Motorcycle for a Health Care Worker

Most people in Sumba must walk to receive treatment at a clinic. For the sickest people and for pregnant women this is often not possible. Our medical staff needs to travel not only to the clinics but also to remote villages every day to care for those that cannot walk; they often are the most urgent and life threatening cases. If we are not mobile we are not effective.

Provide an Ambulance

The trip from our central clinic to the hospital is 45 minutes by car. Currently, two to four patients a week need emergency evacuation to the hospital and at times cars are not just available. Most of the life threatening cases that we deal with are women with birthing complications and infants with cerebral malaria, in all cases the patients are within hours of death.

Our ability to mobilize and get patients to the hospital has saved those patients lives. However as we expand, in the most critical of situations, our ability to save lives will be dependant on being how fast we can respond and how fast we can evacuate those that need it.

Improve the Sumbanese Hospitals

Direct Relief International is providing us with one 20 ft. container of urgently needed medicine, supplies and equipment each year. This is enough medicine and equipment to support our clinics as well as improve the services at the 3 government hospitals and its 16 clinics.

Each year we send many emergency patients to the hospitals for treatment that we cannot provide. Therefore we feel it is important to continually improve the facilities at the hospitals so they have the tools they need to work with.

Sponsor a Nurse for a Year

The demand for our healthcare services continues to rise now that we have proven to the people that we are serious about helping them and that we are here for the long term, we have earned their trust. Now, because of our established reputation for quality healthcare, people are traveling many miles to seek treatment at our clinics.

As we take our healthcare system outwards to new areas we will always need to employ more nurses, they are our most important asset. We provide our nurses with housing, 3 meals per day, health coverage, life insurance and a pension plan.

Sponsor a Life-Changing Surgery

It is truly heartbreaking to see a child or young adult afflicted with a disability that can be cured. These children are often shunned from the society. Many do not go to school and the girls will probably never get married and have children of their own. The hospitals in Sumba do not have the facilities, nor do the doctors have the ability, to perform plastic or orthopedic surgery. And even if they could, in most cases, the parents of the afflicted children cannot afford it.

These were children and teenagers with club feet that need orthopedic surgery, others with massive facial tumors, and infants with hydrocephalus and heart conditions. These cases require numerous operations and several journeys to Bali often staying a month or more each time.

For them we have been able to organize surgeons in Bali to perform the operations and already five have been successfully treated. This year we have two more children who desperately need someone to help them.

We have contracted several rooms nearby the hospital in Bali and our staff checks in on the patient and the accompanying family member each day while they are there.

Other Healthcare Needs

• Life-saving medicine to treat 100 people for one year - US$500
• Vitamins for 1,000 school children - US$250 / month
• A month of medical supplies for one of our clinics - US$250