Thankful

The last Friday of every month, the staff at the hospital meets together for a whole day of prayer where we remember the blessings we had over the past month and put forward specific prayer requests. On 29th November we met, and had a wonderful time of sharing the blessing we enjoyed over 2013 and thanking the Lord for each of them. 

Apologies for the delay in sharing these with you all . . .

Please join us in thanking the Lord for each of the blessings. 

1. The hospital has been done well in 2013 in spite of major challenges. The absence of a surgeon was a major challenge as traditionally we are known as a surgical centre. We thank the Lord that the requirements in terms of finances and other requirements have been met so far especially in the light of a salary revision this year. 

2. Sampoorn Development India, one like-minded organisation has facilitated the construction of a water-tank in the campus. The Lord willing, the construction should be over very soon. 

3. The hospital has got an exclusive electricity connection to the campus and the electricity supply to the region has improved tremendously with us getting an average of 20-22 hours of electricity every day. 

4. There was a portion of land which was donated to us by one of our staff about 2 decades back. Unfortunately, few of the locals had been preventing us from taking occupation of the land. The Lord worked in the minds of these locals and has enabled us to take possession of the land. We could construct a boundary for this land and last week, the Maintenance Department started to cultivate on this land. 

5. Our Community Health Projects have been doing well so far. The impact made by the Climate Change Project, Community Based Rehabilitation Project is being slowly seen in the community. 

6. Our engagement with the government has increased over the last year. In the sphere of Tuberculosis Control, the Tuberculosis Unit caters to a population of over 750,000 population and the Global Fund Project increases awareness about the disease in the district. The UNICEF had requested us to oversee the mentoring of Labour Room facilities in Palamu and Latehar districts, thereby influencing Reproductive and Child Health in the region. Today, we were informed that we have been once more been authorized to disburse funds under the Janani Suraksha Yojana. This scheme was discontinued about 2 years back saying that we did not qualify as we did not have the requisite facilities in terms of personnel. 

7. We live in a region with tremendous amount of social unrest. We estimate that our hospital vehicles travels an average of 300 kilometers every day. We thank the Lord for safety and protection from accidents. 

8. We had some amazing stories of miraculous healing over the last year. We thank the Lord for each of these patients. Many of these patients had come to us as a last resort. 

9. There have been few constructions in the hospital. We thank the Lord for the funds that has enabled us to do these constructions. Please remember the burns unit, critical care unit, the sarai etc.  for which we need more funds. 

10. We thank the Lord for the new staff who joined in 2013. Dr. Roshine Mary Koshy (Medicine Consultant), Dr. Grace Mary George (Medical Officer), Dr. Aroma Tirkey (Dentist), Ms. Meghala Ramasamy, Mr. Jonathan Hongsha (IT Manager), Ms. Sheron Mathew (Physiotherapist), Mr. Asherush (Pharmacist) and Mrs. Tavitha, Ms. Priyanka, Ms. Premadini (Staff Nurses). 

These are the first ten items of thanks and praise which came. There were many more . . . 

Partnerships . . .

Dr. Titus taking a class for the Child Fund India staff

Last week, we were roped into one more partnership with another Non-governmental organisation working in the theme of Child Health in our region. Child Fund, formerly Christian Child Fund has been working along with few local NGOs in the region for quite a long time. It was quite a surprise when we had a visit from Mr. Ashok Panda, Area Manager of Child Fund India to help their partner organisations with training in the areas of Reproductive and Child Health.

The Emmanuel Hospital Association has accepted the principle of working in partnerships with other like-minded organisations in the regions we serve. And NJH has long been following this principle.

In addition to other NGOs in the region, our major partnership with the public healthcare network of the government.

NJH is one of the first Tuberculosis Units under the PPP (public private partnership) program of the Revised National Tuberculosis Program of the Government of India. In addition, we continue to be part of the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (Health Insurance Scheme of the government). Earlier, we were part of the Mukhya Mantri Janani Suraksha Yojana. However, it was withdrawn from our side as according to the rules, we had to have specialists in Medicine, Surgery, Obstetrics and Pediatrics.

Couple of months back, we were roped in by UNICEF Jharkhand to facilitate the monitoring of Skilled Birth Attendants and Labour Rooms of Public Care facilities in the districts of Palamu and Latehar. 

Then, we are in partnership with the Health and Development wing of the Catholic Church, both at the state level and the local diocesan level. This partnership has been quite encouraging. We are involved in trainings, specialist consultations, health camps etc. along with them.

There are couple of mission agencies, the Calvary Gospel Mission and Gospel Echoing Missionary Society along  with whom we work in tandem. Recently, we held 2 medical camps along with CGM. We are yet to look at the outputs. I'm sure there will be outcomes too in the long run. There were about 700 patients who came to these camps. 

The consultation for Child Fund India is quite a major step towards extending our influence to a wider population. The challenge is to find more like minded colleagues who would be willing to share the burden and hold hands along . . . 

Maternal Health Care in Palamu - Red letter day

Today was a red letter day in the history of maternal health care of our region.


The UNICEF along with the district health authorities of Palamu district had arranged for a training session on Facility Based Maternal Death Review. I understand that soon there would also be efforts taken for training grassroot workers on Community Based Maternal Death Review.


Mr Prabodh Kujur and myself represented NJH as we have quite a large burden of adverse maternal events including maternal mortality. Over the last 1 year, we calculated about 20 maternal deaths within the facility. This excludes at least 5 patients who were brought dead.


One of the key messages which was conveyed to all the doctors who came was about the absence of a blame factor in the whole exercise. Many a time, adverse health events are not reported because of a fear of punishment. I was very glad that the message was conveyed well.

As I sat there, images of mothers who died or almost died, those who ended up with lifelong complications and dead babies flashed before me.

I remembered AB's baby who just made it whereas she should have been referred faster. BD, whose life has turned for the worse was a poignant face whom I would remember for the rest of my life. One of the major finding I would expect from the reviews is the strong association between malnutrition and anemia. 

The mental stress that KD's family endured was still fresh in my mind. Our experiences with patients like RD, who lost her baby or SD, for whom we had to intervene heroically have already taught us that the delay in taking the decision to go to the healthcare provider and the delay in implementing the decision is quite costly in the lives of mothers and newborn. I'm certain that this is going to be one of the major learning in this exercise.

I'm excited about the whole excercise. We look forward to a time of learning and understanding determinants influencing maternal health care in this region during the maternal death review meetings at the institutional and district level.

More than that we look forward to a period in our surrounding communities where pregnancy is more safe whereby families will cherish and enjoy motherhood which would be the ultimate aim of such an exercise.