Feature Story

Community volunteers & health providers
in Kenya

Doctors of the World USA’s (DOW) HIV Prevention, Care, and Treatment project has been operating in the West Pokot District of Kenya since 2004.  Through an innovative partnership with Indiana University’s Academic Model for Prevention and Treatment of HIV/AIDS (AMPATH) program and the Kenyan health authorities, DOW is establishing comprehensive HIV/AIDS care services, starting at the Kapenguria District Hospital, a facility that serves this District of over 360,000 people.  As part of the project, DOW trains local health workers, providing them with the necessary clinical skills to help address the growing pandemic.  Antony Siret is among the staff of the District Hospital working with DOW in West Pokot.

At age 18, Antony watched helplessly as his baby brother died in a medical facility.  Diagnosed with anemia, his brother began bleeding through his nose and mouth in the middle of the night, and though Antony yelled for the nurses, they did not come.  It was then that he decided he wanted a career in the medical field so that others would not suffer the same fate. He went on to become a nurse working in the Kodich Dispensary, which lies about 50 km north of Kapenguria, home to the nearest hospital and DOW’s HIV/AIDS treatment program in Kenya.  A trip from Kapenguria, by the only available road, takes at least 1.5 hours. 

In 2005, Antony went through a one-week training program on the prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV (PMTCT) sponsored by DOW.  He began conducting PMTCT testing in January 2006 and within three weeks he had tested 70 people, including 28 traditional birth attendants (TBAs). Antony works with these TBAs to refer pregnant women to the dispensary for antenatal care. 

Prior to the program, he notes, people in the community thought HIV-testing was complicated and that it could not be done locally.  But now, after only a couple of months, people have grown accustomed to the program and accept being tested. Through a single week of training, Antony learned how to talk to the community about the importance of PMTCT, and he gained the skills to initiate these activities in the small village of Kodich where he trained 30 TBAs in PMTCT referral.  Though the work is challenging, he is pleased that he is now doing the work he promised his baby brother he would do.

DOW provides training and knowledge to health workers like Antony at projects around the world, allowing Peer Health Educators to fight TB in Romania; nurse aides in Chiapas, Mexico to administer care to their indigenous communities; physicians in the United States to identify the signs of torture;  and equipping many others to play an active and long-term role in improving the health of their communities.