A BUSY WEEK

THREE SPECIAL VISITORS TO ARROW WEB HOSPITAL

What a day! On Friday Bram welcomed three international visitors from different organisations to Arrow Web Hospital.

Paul from Tour d'Afrique, Toronto Canada

As you know, Paul McManus from Tour d'Afrique had hoped to be able to visit us this week, after he and his colleagues had given us the very generous gift of twenty five bikes, at a local ceremony in Nairobi on Sunday.

Paul was very keen to see for himself the difference these bikes make to the work of our Community Outreach Team members, who rely on them to reach even further into the slums. One of the main roles of our Community Outreach Team is to let people know about the services we offer at the hospital, particularly to encourage expectant mothers to come to the antenatal clinics regularly, have their babies delivered here and then bring their babies to our immunisation clinics. http://www.tourdafrique.com/

John from COCO, Newcastle UK

John, a new member of COCO's team based in Newcastle in the UK visited us too, for the first time. You may remember that Lucy now a director at COCO, and her colleague Kat came to see us last May. As a result, COCO decided to support some of our work with children. COCO has also already pledged over £3000 or 400,000 Ksh to help transport the container of essential medical equipment and suppplies from the UK to Mombasa.

John was particularly interested to hear about our Comprehensive Care Project, targeted at some of our poorest children and orphans. This project ensures there is enough annual funding for the treatment of these children at Arrow Web Hospital, and for the childhood immunisations they need. This year we aim to double the number of children we help in this way to two hundred. These children are the most vulnerable in our community to diseases and illness, many of which are life threatening.

We also discussed with John our plans to set up a system of solar panels, which would give us a continuous electricity supply. At the moment we have great problems when the supply breaks down and equipment fails us. http://www.coco.org.uk/

Jacq from Moray Community Health and Social Care Partnership, Moray UK

Friday was Jacq's first opportunity to see Arrow Web Hospital for herself, having arrived from the UK on Thursday night. Of course she had heard all about us from her colleagues Jamie and Liz from NHS Grampian, who visited us last September. She brought with her a laptop, camera and video camera which had been donated by some of our friends in the UK. She also brought a huge bag of essential medical supplies which Dr Ishmael Onyango, our senior doctor was really pleased with.

Jacq is a self funding volunteer who will be working with us for two weeks. She will be looking at ways of recording all our activity electronically and helping Bram set up electronic systems to make managing our finances easier and more efficient. She hopes to go out into the community with Rachel our Community Outreach Team leader, to find out more about the team's work. This will help with fundraising and in planning for the future. MHSCP link: http://tinyurl.com/4nfnotm

We look forward to hearing more about Jacq's visit and hopefully there will be plenty photos Bram!

Paul, John and Jacq outside Arrow Web Hospital

We are always so pleased to welcome visitors to Arrow Web Hospital and to know that friends all over the world support us. If you would like to hear more about the work we do or would like to arrange a visit, please contact us at http://www.arrowkenya.org/

GENEROSITY FROM INTERNATIONAL DONORS

A BIG THANK YOU TO TOUR D'AFRIQUE

Another year has passed and again we must thank Tour d'Afrique for their great generosity in donating twenty five new bikes for our Community Outreach Team. At a well attended celebration yesterday, the bikes were handed over to us as the riders make their way on the four month long cycle ride from Cairo to Cape Town.

These bikes are so essential to the services we provide in the community, allowing our community support workers to reach a much wider area and of course much more quickly.

The Tour d'Afrique tents

Organising the seating for the speeches

Job our assistant board secretary says thank you

Bram looks at the bikes with the guys from Tour d'Afrique

"What great bikes"

A final thank you and "safe journey" to South Africa from Bram

Many thanks to Mrs Rono for organising the event

More about Tour d'Afrique and the Tour d'Afrique Foundation

Tour d'Afrique is a company based in Toronto which organises cycle tours and races, all over the world. ( http://www.tourdafrique.com/ ) It is famous for its annual tour from Cairo to Cape Town and it is on this long journey that its cyclists stop to hand over bikes to Arrow Kenya. You can read about all their amazing adventures on the blog on their website.

The Tour d'Afrique Foundation is a key part of the company vision and was set up at the same time as the company. The Foundation's mission is :

"To give something back to the people and communities that we pass through on our cycling tours" and

"To raise consciousness about bicycles as an alternative, and in many ways better and more beneficial means of transport"

One of the ways the Foundation achieves its objectives is by donating bikes to individuals and organisations in Africa.

Children from the local orphanage say "Thank you Tour d'Afrique for our bikes too - we hope to see you next year and wish you a safe journey to Cape Town"

We are really pleased that Paul McManus from Tour d'Afrique is finding time to visit us at Arrow Web Hospital. Bram will be able to show him around and tell him more about how the bikes really make a difference to the work of our Community Outreach Team.

ANOTHER BUSY WEEK AT ARROW WEB HOSPITAL

Treating an outbreak in a local orphanage

Apart from the usual services we provide, last week was particularly busy as there was an outbreak of diarrhoea at a local orphanage. So it was "all hands on deck" for our doctors and nurses. As treatment for these children is not covered by the funds we receive from the government we have set up a Comprehensive Care Program for them and other poorer children to make sure they can receive the immunisations and drug treatment they need when they need it. Our board has always funded this program, but this year we are applyng for funds to extend it to help more of our most vulnerable children in our community.

Next in line for an injection

And the girls too

Our senior Doctor Ishmael Onyango gives advice to a young girl

Government report

Bram has been busy completing a very lengthy government report. Although we submit information to the District Health Authority every month, for the first time we are now being asked to complete forms about all our activity related to the government's health indicators. We are also being asked to complete detailed plans to show how we are working towards government targets. Fortunately Arrow Kenya board has already drawn up a plan for this year, taking into account these targets.

The government is expecting us to add the protection of children, adolescents and the elderly to our plans so we will be making it a priority this year.