The last few days have been great! After our focus groups on Monday and Tuesday, a few people worked on translating the focus groups with the translators for the rest of the week. The rest of us visited pharmacies to start gathering information about contraceptives. We went without translators, so we had fun trying to communicate with our broken Creole. I'm far from fluent but I'm getting better! I try to practice with our cooks at the guesthouse. Using the information we gathered from the pharmacies, we are going to work on understanding what views the women in the area have of contraceptives. We then plan to create a brochure/comic strip/video to educate them on contraceptives. We are working with some of the nursing students from the nursing school nearby to create these materials in a way that the Haitians will actually understand, since education here doesn't work the same way it does in the U.S.
On Saturday, I worked at a local pharmacy with one of the other girls. We spent a few hours there and learned a lot about the medicines and the doctor/patient/pharmacist relationship in Haiti. The pharmacist told us that there is virtually no relationship between the pharmacy and the doctor, which is a huge problem. People come with prescriptions that are barely legible, so the pharmacist has to guess what the doctor prescribed based on the medical problem the patient has. It's crazy that this problem has such a simple solution- doctors writing neatly- yet it's still a problem The pharmacist also told us that preventative care is still not where it should be in Haiti. He told us that because people don't clean their toilets and don't take basic sanitary precautions when going to the bathroom, many women get infections that they then treat with medication, until the infection is gone. He told us that the women could simply throw a little bleach on their toilet to keep it clean and prevent future infections, but unfortunately, women just don't take these preventative measures. We plan to work on emphasizing prevention in our education materials.
|
The pharmacist's son, Webster |
|
Amber, Jean Guy, and me |
Saturday afternoon, we went to Mon P'tit Village, a school and activity center near our guesthouse. It's a really nice area with lots of plants and trees, grass, a school area, a soccer field, a Voodoo temple, a restaurant, a guesthouse, and a huge gazebo where they hold free dance/art/music lessons for the children in the area. We went to take some dance lessons, and we learned the cha cha. They had two groups- advanced and beginner. We all took the beginner lessons and he taught us really well! We learned enough to dance to the music and do a couple different moves. At the end, everyone from both classes mixed together and everyone danced together. We all just kept switching partners, and it was really fun. The Haitians are so friendly and open- they're not shy about coming up to us and dancing. When I was standing and watching, a little girl came right up to me and started dancing with me and she was so good- she led the whole time.
Pictures of the guesthouse (interior):
|
Living/Dining Area |
|
|
|
|
Kitchen |
|
Hallway- leads to laundry room, guest bathroom, 4 bedrooms and 4 full bathrooms |
|
The girls' bedroom |
|
Our bathroom |
|
The worst part of Haiti....tarantulas and other big spiders. |
|
Mama Duck and her ducklings |
|
|
|