First Week of Work

On Wednesday, I had the chance to visit two rural villages, approximately 45 minutes outside of Mysore. Saroja, who has a background in social work, administered our new survey to three women as a pilot run. PHRI has been working on Project Kisalaya, which involves health screening and a questionnaire for pregnant women in rural villages around Mysore. The new survey is intended as a follow-up, to obtain information on birth outcomes (ie. where did the birth occur, were there any complications, etc.). The interviews seemed to run smoothly and only took around 15 minutes to administer. After a few small changes, it will be ready to go.

The view across the street from the village

The central street of the village

On Thursday I got go to see how the health clinics for Project Kisalaya run. We went to a school in a small village, and used one of the classrooms as our temporary health clinic. PHRI staff went out and with the assistance of a local nurse in charge of the village, recruited women to come to the health clinic and enroll in the study. The process involved four steps: registration, counseling/the interview, a medical check-up with Dr. Bhavana, and collection of specimens for screening with nurse Rani. We were at the school for 5 hours, and approximately 12 women were enrolled in the study.

PHRI staff getting setting up for the clinic

Everyone hard at work

I was unable to find a way to be helpful, so I entertained the school children, who LOVED getting their pictures taken.

Students at the school

On Saturday, which is commonly a half-day of work in India, PHRI held a training for government nurses who are in charge of the villages around Mysore. The training, which ran from 10 to 5, covered a range of topics, but was focused on HIV and included a speaker who was HIV positive. As a review before lunch, the nurses broke into two teams and played Who Wants to be a Millionaire.