For the last 40 years, Mama Licha has worked as a midwife
and nurse in Esteli. Thorough the Civil
war and revolution, she has been a human
rights activist she has always seen people regardless of their ability to be
seen and continue to live by ideals that healthy communities start with healthy
women who are treated with dignity.
We partnered with her after meeting in 2002. Her dream was to have her own clinic, when we met her she saw folks in her kitchen which was partitioned by a wood wall and due to lack of electricity was using a head lamp for pelvic exams. We quickly raised the funds and equipped her clinic on her land in Esteli. Today, Mama Licha operates her own clinic which is the first midwifery clinic an official part of the public health system: although she has taken break from attending births regularly, she continues to do over 1000 pap smears a year, provide essential medicines and contraception, provide treatment for STDS and prenatal classes, geared often towards adolescents and their partners.
She serves as a health advisor in the town and can often be heard on the radio and seen on local TV issues discussing in her down to earth style . She also does outreach on specific health topics at the local cigar factories. In her spare time on Sundays, she volunteers with the brigade Sandinista going to rural regions to do pap smear and prenatal care.
She is also a integrated member of the team of centro de salud, and a leader among the 75 midwives in ESteli. Her current dream is open a midwifery school, since the average age is over 50. Mama has also been trained in western and natural medicine, which is both grown and produced locally. She is known for her mistela which is used for after a baby is born to reduce bleeding and cramps. She brews it herself.
Mama Licha, with Centro de Salud, helped us create a global nursing rotation through Yale University where over 60 students learned what it was like to provide services in low resources setting and discover the true nature of collaboration—where projects are designed by the community, operated by the community and meet the specific needs of the community. The integrated clinical rotation: included working with nurses in small outposts through the town, participating in vaccine campaigns door to door and rural health fairs, learning about natural medicine, while taking intensive Spanish classes. Of course each student needed to bring 50lbs of medical supplies to take apart in the program.
Many of our students went on to provide clinical services in Ghana, Haiti, Afghanistan, Burundi and continue to contribute globally.
We partnered with her after meeting in 2002. Her dream was to have her own clinic, when we met her she saw folks in her kitchen which was partitioned by a wood wall and due to lack of electricity was using a head lamp for pelvic exams. We quickly raised the funds and equipped her clinic on her land in Esteli. Today, Mama Licha operates her own clinic which is the first midwifery clinic an official part of the public health system: although she has taken break from attending births regularly, she continues to do over 1000 pap smears a year, provide essential medicines and contraception, provide treatment for STDS and prenatal classes, geared often towards adolescents and their partners.
She serves as a health advisor in the town and can often be heard on the radio and seen on local TV issues discussing in her down to earth style . She also does outreach on specific health topics at the local cigar factories. In her spare time on Sundays, she volunteers with the brigade Sandinista going to rural regions to do pap smear and prenatal care.
She is also a integrated member of the team of centro de salud, and a leader among the 75 midwives in ESteli. Her current dream is open a midwifery school, since the average age is over 50. Mama has also been trained in western and natural medicine, which is both grown and produced locally. She is known for her mistela which is used for after a baby is born to reduce bleeding and cramps. She brews it herself.
Mama Licha, with Centro de Salud, helped us create a global nursing rotation through Yale University where over 60 students learned what it was like to provide services in low resources setting and discover the true nature of collaboration—where projects are designed by the community, operated by the community and meet the specific needs of the community. The integrated clinical rotation: included working with nurses in small outposts through the town, participating in vaccine campaigns door to door and rural health fairs, learning about natural medicine, while taking intensive Spanish classes. Of course each student needed to bring 50lbs of medical supplies to take apart in the program.
Many of our students went on to provide clinical services in Ghana, Haiti, Afghanistan, Burundi and continue to contribute globally.
