More on Porayar

As in Kodai I met with creche staff and parents in Porayar to talk about what they perceived as health issues in their community.
Recurring requests were for latrines; for an accessible, affordable place in the community to go for evaluation and treatment of common illnesses and minor injuries and to receive effective medications at low or no cost; and for someone to assist with and continue the work of the local traditional birth attendant/"granny midwife" so that women could have safe home births. I will be working with creche nurse, Regina, on the latter two issues and we began by purchasing some basic supplies and medications for her.
Once word got out in the village that I was visiting, I experienced a constant stream of "patients", people with a variety of maladies, some very serious or life threatening, who arrived at the creche to see me. I was at a loss as to what was expected of me. And I had little to offer. Fortunately everyone seemed happy enough if I just reviewed the handheld medical cards they carried with their diagnoses and prescriptions and encouraged them to continue follow up with the available doctors and nurses at the local government hospitals. Many asked me to pray with and for them.
Pictured at top is the parent meeting, next a family I met in which the mother had delivered quadruplets (spontaneous, not the result of fertility drugs). Two of the four babies survived, weighing 1.3 and 1.5 kg each and spending the first month of life in the hospital. This seemed truly remarkable to me. This mom, as is typical in Indian families, is the last in the family to eat after husband and children and it was pretty obvious by her physical appearance.
The families in Kodai typically have two children, while in Porayar four and more children are common. Not surprisingly the degree of poverty seems much more severe in Porayar.
We were able to help this family with rice and eggs and some iron supplements for the mom. Sadly this was only a bandaid for their chronic financial problems.
The bottom photo is of a family in which the father is suffering from diabetes and has a serious infection in his foot, precluding work. Diabetes seems to be rampant here, probably in part due to a lot of intermarriage and the hereditary nature of the disease. Controlling blood sugar through diet is extremely difficult when rice is the staple and eaten three times a day by poor families. This man had us all very worried. He wrote me a heartbreaking letter in broken English asking for help constructing a new house. At present the family is living in a flimsy palm branch shelter which will probably not survive the monsoon season. Again we sent rice and eggs and supplies for his wife to use in changing his dressing. I will be checking in with him when I return to Porayar at the end of this month (October).
The third photo is of me holding a baby brought in by his grandmother. The story was that the baby "cried all the time" and had been taken to many doctors who reportedly told the family the baby was okay. As I looked at him I noticed that he threw his head back and arched his back and was very irritable and difficult to comfort. As I talked with the grandmother I learned the baby had been ill with fever (maybe meningitis) and appeared to have suffered some brain damage. I suspect the family was told the baby was okay meaning nothing could be done at this point.