Why Uganda?This June and July seven UBC Midwifery students will spend six weeks in Uganda to broaden our understanding of global maternal/infant health, gain experience in low-resource maternity care, and learn from a team of Ugandan midwives. As well, we can’t wait to work with all of the mothers and babes!
The UBC Students for Global Citizenship (SGC) program has been running since 2006. Historically, students have traveled to Nepal, Uganda, Holland, Zambia, and Mexico. Today, the program centers mostly on Uganda and Nepal. SGC is unique to other international electives programs because our clinical preceptors are a combination of midwives from BC and Uganda and we return consistently to the same communities year after year. Our preceptors also provide train-the-trainer workshops for Ugandan midwives on neonatal resuscitation and emergency skills. As a result of building this long-term partnership previous students tell us that there is much reciprocity and friendship between the us and the Ugandan hospital staff. It should be an intense, but amazing experience.
With this in mind; why Uganda? What are some of the key issues that we will be faced with during our time in the Global South? It seems a little strange to begin with statistics, but for context, we know that 99% of maternal/infant deaths occur in developing nations. While maternal mortality figures vary widely by source (and are highly controversial) the best estimates for Uganda suggest that roughly between 6,500 and 13,500 women and girls die each year due to pregnancy-related complications. Additionally, another 130,000 to 405,000 women and girls will suffer from disabilities caused by problems in pregnancy and childbirth each year. Many of these women die from completely preventable medical complications from things like post-partum hemorrhage, gaps in access to essential supplies like IV cannulas, delay in attending care facilities, shortage of skilled birth attendants, and lack of cesarean section capacity. Social/political factors also play a huge role including: the status of women/girls; the impact of colonization and globalization; and the shifts to user-pay health care as a result of the Structural Adjustment Policies. As well, many women develop huge complications from lack of access to safe, legal abortions or post-abortion care.
This list leaves me with more questions than answers-is there anything that can be done to assist in building positive change that works for Uganda families? Or, is the work better focused here at home to pressure our government to shift the broader global factors that keep Ugandan women in poverty? There is much to process here; hopefully over the next two months we will learn from our Ugandan counterparts and begin to unravel some of these threads to find some clarity about the role BC midwives and students can play in creating a more positive world for mothers and their babies.
-Elizabeth
Want to Read More?
a) New York Times article on maternal mortality in Uganda: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/30/world/africa/30uganda.html?pagewanted=all
b) Uganda news article about maternal mortality in Uganda: http://www.observer.ug/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=15320:maternal-deaths-midwives-missing-in-rural-areas-&catid=58:health-living&Itemid=89
c) Canadian organization Shanti Uganda: www.shantiuganda.org/pages/birth
d) UBC Students for Global Citizenship: http://www.midwifery.ubc.ca/midwifery/internationalmidwifery/globeCit.htm?PageMode=HTML
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