Summary
Sierra Leone was PHBB's second international project, where we collaborated on a water sanitation project, led workshops on hygiene, first aid, and malaria, and trained Community Health Workers from the Calaba Town community.
Topics
Water sanitation, nutrition, hygiene, oral hygiene, first aid, Ebola, malaria, typhoid fever, cholera, reproductive and menstrual health
Our second international project in Sierra Leone traveled for the first time in June 2014. The team traveled with Maryland Sustainability Engineering (MDSE) to collaborate on a water sanitation project at Abigail D. Butscher Primary School in Calaba Town, Sierra Leone. The project is the result of relationships with the Madieu Williams Foundation (MWF) and MDSE -- while the latter built a new rainwater catchment system and UV disinfection system, PHBB members led educational workshops on water sanitation, hygienic practices such as hand-washing and tooth-brushing, and Oral Rehydration Therapy.
During the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, PHBB could not return to Sierra Leone. However, the group held a t-shirt fundraiser to help support MWF in its efforts to provide rice to members of the Calaba Town community.
In June 2016, the team traveled to Sierra Leone to conduct health education workshops on handwashing, first aid, and malaria, and conduct needs assessment evaluations at the Abigail D. Butscher Primary School. They also interviewed the community about the impact of the Ebola epidemic to better understand their perspectives on the event, and learn about other health concerns. The team meets weekly to analyze data, prepare evaluation results, and research health concerns indicated by the community, such as typhoid, cholera and ulcers.
PHBB returned in June 2017 and orchestrated workshops focusing on handwashing, first aid, and TCORT, which includes information about Typhoid Fever, Cholera, and Oral Rehydration Therapy. In 2018, our team returned to Calaba Town, Sierra Leone. They conducted workshops pertaining to chronic diseases and nutrition. Furthermore, our team administered needs-based assessments with the community. We determined that training Community Health Workers, volunteers from within the Calaba Town community, would be most beneficial. Therefore, our current goals for the 2019 trip are to raise funds to train five Community Health Workers, as well as revisiting previous workshops. We will also be focusing on reproductive and menstrual health.
Photos From Sierra Leone
See more of where we work
Prince George's County, Maryland
PHBB's Local Projects began in 2014 with the start of a student chapter of Public health Without Borders. Students worked with the Madieu Williams Foundation’s “Dieu’s Crew” at Hyattsville Elementary School providing workshops and tutoring with children who were enrolled in the afterschool program.
Compone, Peru
The first PHBB international trip began as a collaboration between a few public health students and the UMD chapter of Engineers Without Borders (EWB) on a project centered around the installation of a water chlorination system. Public Health members went around and did qualitative interviews about health challenges, needs in the community, and water.