Gogo to Gogo Programme

The Gogo group was started in 2008 by Eunice Mangwane from SA, Sue McNab from the UK and Annette Woudstra from Canada/SA.

It began by wanting to honour the strength of the women in our community who often have had to suffer the loss of their own children to disease and then take care of their grandchildren. Crossroads and Lover’s Twist have successful and now independent chicken-raising projects, and soon Hamburg village has just started their own with great success.

Ntilini and Bodium villages have large organic gardens that they were taught to run by the Keiskamma Trust Gardeners and they are still supported weekly by them. Rain tanks, seeds and tools were provided to them through the fundraising efforts of the Bourne End Gogo group who have so far donated over 160 000 Rands to this programme and to the chicken growing groups.

Over 70 Grandmothers attended our first rally in July of 2011—representing 6 villages and marking the first time that they have all been brought together. We had such fun and the Gogos enjoyed showing off their energy and joy in life—which is a encouragement to us all.

Nozeti Makhubalo

The Keiskamma Trust Gogo to Gogo groups are supported primarily through the fund and awareness raising efforts of the Bourne End Gogo, UK.

The Women of Hope Group in Edmonton Alberta, Canada, have also assisted in funding this programme.

Both Grandmother Groups in the UK and in Canada have also generously supported the other programmes of the Trust that impact Grandmothers’ lives directly—the Health Project, which provides home-based care and HIV/AIDs services to over 40 villages in our district, and the Art Project which provides essential income generating opportunities for many Grandmothers who struggle to support large families with very limited resources or support.

Contact Annette at annette@keiskamma.org for up-to-date info on the Gogo programme, or to find out how to help support this initiative.

Health - Training the Village Health Worker Trainers in Hamburg: 25 – 29 October 2010

A week-long ‘train the trainer’ session got off to an uncertain start on Monday 25th October when we heard that our expert trainer who was to have flown in from Rwanda, had been arrested at Kigali Airport.

Fortunately for us, Partners in Health whose training programme we were to follow, have produced an excellent trainers manual, with step-by-step instructions on how to proceed. Our training event picked up steam during the week and by all their reports our participants had a most informative and entertaining experience.

The purpose of the week’s programme was to familiarise future Xhosa-speaking trainers with the Village Health Worker’s Handbook, adapted from Partners in Health’s Accompagnateur handbook and with PIH-designed training methods. The Handbook was well received by course participants. It is written in comfortable English and a number of participants on the course felt that it would be most useful to VHWs in the field.

The train the trainer course covered recognition of HIV and AIDS, tuberculosis and sexually transmitted infections; management of HIV and TB; psycho-social support skills and duties and responsibilities of Village Health Workers.

The PIH training manual is full of engaging and interesting activities. The highlight was probably our Thursday afternoon ‘radio show’ when participants ‘phoned in’ questions to a panel of expert Village Health Workers, for their responses to various challenges that would be presented to VHWs at work.

We are happy to report that our expert trainer has been released by the Rwandan police and that the charges brought against him were proven to have been false.

Post by Dr. Paul Roux

Health - Umtha Welanga Step Down Unit

Keiskamma Trust has been working towards the establishment of a step-down unit at Nompumelelo Hospitstal in Peddie-Town for the past three years. Early in 2009, the hospital made a ward available to us for the step-down unit and for nearly a year, the Keiskamma Health team has been in negotiation with the HIV AIDS directorate of Eatern Cape Province and Nompumelelo Hospital, working on the details. This joint venture is set to open in January 2010. The services offered are essentially what Umtha Welanga has been running for the past five years out of Hamburg – extended care of patients who have been prematurely discharged from Hospital but need care, either because their families are unable to care for them at home, or they need more time for education on the treatment of chronic disease.

Health - 2009 PATA Conference

For the fifth year in a row, Keiskamma Trust Health programme has been invited to attend the PATA AIDS Conference. PATA stands for Paediatric Aids Treatment for Africa and is a yearly forum which brings together top experts in the paediatric care field. This year’s conference was held in Johannesburg and included PATA clinics from across Sub-Sahara. The focus for this year’s forum was on adolescent care. This year’s Keiskamma Trust team was made of Dr Carol Baker-Hofmeyr, Annette Woudstra, Eunice Mangwane and Thobeka Bhekani. The PATA programme consists of cutting edge practices and academic research, and combines that with practical planning for each clinics health program for the following year. It was an incredible privilege to be amongst colleagues providing excellent paediatric care from across Africa and we went away with many new tools and ideas for our paediatric and adolescent care. Keiskamma Trust loomed large during all the PATA proceedings thanks to the large embroidered and appliquéd Africa maps that we donated to the PATA offices in Cape Town, as well as the 145 conference bags that PATA commissioned and purchased from us for each delegate. Many encouraging contacts were developed during the intensive 5-day workshop, including the cementing of our relationship between Kidzpositive, an NGO founded by Dr Paul Roux, Paediatrician at Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town, who is also on our board of Trustees; and Partners In Heath (PIH), plans are on the way for both projects for the next year.

On the photograph: Eunice Mangwane