2017 Impact: Healthy families
Our Health Program was created with the goal of ensuring good health for our families, as illness can stand in the way of all other progress, such as being productive at the workplace or reaching learning potentials in school. In 2017, we had set our sights on the following goals:
- continue our commitment to provide open access to medical care for all families;
- launch a preventative health workshop module to decrease the number of hospital visits;
- provide a medical check up and access to medical care for kids in the First Mile
We're proud to share that we've accomplished these goals. In fulfilling goal #1, our medical partners Hopital Fontaine, Hopital Bernard Mevs, and Hopital Adventiste ensure our families receive quality care. We also worked to provide Hopital Fontaine, our partner clinic in Menelas, with capacity support through donation of medication, supplies, and professional development. This commitment will continue to grow in 2018 to ensure Hopital Fontaine can grow its capacity as we expand our footprint. Through these partnerships, we're pleased to share that our families continue to be healthy and get the access they need to eliminate trips to the emergency room and major illnesses.
To get one step ahead of the game, we also launched our preventative health workshop module to help decrease the number of visits to the hospital. In doing so, we added a Health Coordinator to our team in Haiti, our very own Nicole Fils-Aime, who received a nursing certificate through our financial support a year ago. With added capacity, we launched two preventative health workshops this year. We took our medical data from the past few years to draw out topics that would be most helpful to our families. We also launched an exercise club that includes a monthly run club and a Zumba class. That's right, we've been Running Across Menelas with our families! Nicole also provides home visits for those who need short term case support and for our new moms. We look forward to reporting back on the impact of this program in the new year.
This year, we also expanded our work to more families in Menelas and expanded our reach into the First Mile to total over 400 family members. We partnered with Hopital Fontaine and a crew of medical professionals from US and Canada to host a medical clinic for our newest 146 family members and ensured that they may receive access moving forward. A huge thanks to all involved in making this happen. For many family members, it was their first time stepping foot into a medical facility, and they were thankful for the opportunity.
Eliminating barriers to receive quality medical care results in higher productivity in the workspace for our adults. Our kids are also earning higher grades at school. Join us in continuing to move this forward. Your continued support enables us to provide consistent and quality care for our families. This holiday, join us in a variety of ways. To increasing our impact together in 2018.
