A Life-Changing Experience—

A Medical Mission In Africa For A Local Nursing Student

By Kaaren Valenta

Michelle Robertson has lived her dream of serving as a medical missionary in Africa.

The 22-year-old Newtown resident recently returned from a three-week trip to Ghana where she volunteered in the labor and delivery rooms of a hospital in the village of Keta. A nursing major at Sacred Heart University, she volunteered through Cross Cultural Solutions, a New York, N.Y.-based nonprofit organization, as part of her plan to become a midwife.

“Nothing could ever prepare you for this experience,” she said. “And there is no way that you will ever be the same afterwards.”

When she arrived in Ghana, the contrast to what she had known growing up in Connecticut was startling. “It was like a picture in National Geographic,” she said. “People are living in huts with either a straw or tin roofs weighted down by rocks. The walls are made of cement or clay and [the huts] are packed into small communities where the goats run free. The roads are red dirt, and the women carry things on their heads. It is amazing the way they can balance these large items such as huge buckets of water or piles of clothing.”

In her role as a volunteer at the Keta Government Hospital, she directly participated in 12 births, three of which were caesarian sections, performed in the hospital’s sole operating room, and was indirectly involved “in one way or another” with most of the 80 births that occurred during the three weeks she was there.

“There were usually at least 25 or 30 women in the maternity ward at any time. The ward didn’t have enough beds, so some were on mats that were spread out on the floor,” Ms Robertson said. “The women have to come with everything — their own bedding, cloths to use during birth to catch the blood, and all their own food.”

There is not enough anesthesia, so it is saved to be used in C-sections. 

“All first-time mothers have to have episiotomies [incisions made so that the vaginal opening does not tear during delivery], but there isn’t enough anesthesia so the doctor makes the cut during a labor contraction,” Ms Robertson explained. “I never heard such screams before.”

Death was common at the hospital, as she notes in the journal she kept during the trip.

“Today was my first full day at the hospital. It was one of the best and worst days of my life,” she wrote in her journal on May 28. “The first thing that happened was a baby died. He was bleeding from everywhere — his eyes, ears, nose, mouth. This would not have been so hard for me to deal with except for the fact that the family has to take the baby home; it does not go to a morgue like in America,” she wrote. “So the baby lay in a bed for hours until the family could come. He was wrapped up in a cloth, then we had to put him in a plastic bag, then place him in a duffle bag for the family to come home. I lost it. I cried my eyes out for an hour.”

The best part of the day came later, when she was able to assist in her first C-section. “I was two feet away from the patient for the entire time of the surgery,” she said. “It was the most incredible thing I have ever seen in my life.”

As it later turned out, the mother of this baby boy named the child after Michelle. “His name is Kplorla — which means leader in the native language of Ewe — Michelle Ocansey,” Ms Robertson said. “I became very close to this 40-year-old, first-time mother and plan to keep in touch with her and her child.”

The Keta hospital had three doctors, but two were Cubans who were only there to assist. “The one Ghanaian doctor had to do all of the surgery. Some days he was very tired. I think this was one reason why he delayed doing a C-section on a woman, despite the fact that the nurses warned that the fetal heart rate was light and abnormal,” she said.

By the time the C-section was done the next day, the woman’s bladder and uterus had both ruptured. The rupture was along a scar from the incision made during a C-section four years earlier. The baby died from bleeding caused by the rupture, Ms Robinson said.

Another young woman and her baby died because the hospital did not have a dialysis machine and there was no money to transport her to a larger hospital four hours away in Accura, where there was one dialysis machine.

“[The staff] laughed at me for crying so much when someone died,” Ms Robertson said. “Death was just an accepted part of their lives because it happened so much.”

Women who have given birth at the hospital cannot leave until they have paid their bill, which means some must stay until their husbands return from fishing, one of the common trades. “That’s because the family can’t be billed. They don’t have addresses as we know them, and there isn’t a billing system,” Ms Robertson said.

About 25 volunteers made the trip to Ghana to take part in programs designed to bring people to work together side by side, sharing perspectives, and fostering cultural understanding.

“Thirteen of the volunteers were at my site,” Mr Robertson said. “They did a variety of things. Many were teachers. One girl did AIDS awareness. I was the only nursing student. There were five or six premed students, but most worked at clinics rather than the hospital.”

Although life is hard in Ghana, the people are happy and friendly. The pace of life is very slow, something that was hard to adjust to, Ms Robertson said. “The children are gorgeous. The scenery is spectacular. I hiked in the rainforest to a waterfall that was more than 1,800 feet tall. Then I crossed seven bridges [that were] more than 150 feet over the ground in a canopy walk over the rain forest. At the end of the hike, we went into a slave fort that was so heartbreaking to see.”

To make the trip to Ghana, Michelle Robertson raised, through donations from local residents, organizations, churches, and businesses, nearly $4,000 to cover her flight, housing, meals, bottled water, travel medical insurance, in-country transportation, and other charges.

“I learned so much [in Ghana] about my future profession, it is incredible,” she said. “I saw a total of 12 births, three of which were C-sections. I got to see one set of twins, and a breech vaginal delivery. I was also able to measure the fundus both before and after delivery, monitor babies’ heart beats the old-fashioned way, and give injections.”

There is a need for items like latex gloves, stethoscopes, and blood pressure equipment at the hospital but Ms Robertson said shipping even donated items would be extremely costly. “But I would really, really like to get them a microscope,” she said. “The hospital only has one, in the lab, and the light is broken so they put a lamp next to it. But when the power goes out, as it so often does, they have to use a mirror to shine light from the window.”

“This was an absolutely incredible experience,” she added. “I cannot begin to thank everyone who supported me financially and emotionally so that I was able to make this trip.”

More about Michelle Robertson’s trip can be found at shellinghana.blogspot.com.