Contributed by: Berai
Today I went with Dale Gray and Ken Baillie from Medical Hands for Healing and Dr. Trotta to visit the Municipal Health Center in Bolga and Afrikids Medical Clinic. We gained great insight into the true health status of the Upper East region and further established the link between health and engineering.
Our meeting with Dr. Alexis Nang-Beifubah from the Municipal Health Center was honest and alarming, but equally helpful and productive. For more than an hour Alexis painted a picture of the reality of the health in the Upper East through statistics and anecdotes. There are a lot of opportunities for EWB-NAU and Medical Hands for Healing to collaborate health and engineering to improve the quality of life in the Upper East. Alexis responded positively to Dale and Ken with their potential plans to return to the Upper East with a surgical team and supplies to alleviate some of the stress on the doctors in the Upper East. The surgical team would also be able to train and educate local doctors to do procedures with the equipment they bring, so they can provide more services to the citizens of the Upper East. Alexis said it best, “health is not medicine.” This is when engineering and EWB jumps in because health is related to water quality, infrastructure, waste water management of a community----medicine is merely a response. Alexis' point was if engineers can come to the Upper East and improve the aforementioned then his medical staff can have time to focus on patients with other ailments that are not directly related to water or infrastructure because everyone else would have good health, thus improving the overall quality of health in the Upper East.
After meeting with Alexis we drove over to meet with 
the staff at the Afrikids Medical Clinic. This portion of the morning was heartbreaking. When we entered the clinic there were a good number of people: men, women, and children waiting to be seen by the doctor. Despite the look of being overwhelmed and exhausted, the doctor and nurse expressed their desire to improve their clinic so they can continue to help people. The doctor expressed that he is overwhelmed with cases relating to malaria, and diarrheal diseases that it is difficult for him to help others who may be going into labor or have other illnesses. He also mentioned that his clinic needs more space for beds, but there is a problem of staffing more doctors and nurses as well. Some roofs within the clinic were leaking---a great place to have some engineers or construction management folks come in and do some repairs. The need for additional medical equipment is there as well.
By the end of the morning my heart was saddened by the health conditions of the Upper East, but simultaneously my heart was uplifted because EWB and their partners can bring positive change to many peoples lives.
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