Infinite Hope: July 2007

Monday, July 23, 2007

Home-Based Care Volunteer Profile

Ntombi Mayaba

Ntombi lives in Kwa Vala village has been caring for her sick and dying neighbors since 2005. She saw the assistance that her friend Elsie in neighboring eMandabeni was providing to the sick and orphaned, and decided to motivate her neighbors to do the same. Ntombi is now the leader of the KwaVala home-based care group, which consists of herself and two other active HBC volunteers.

Ntombi attends a Presbyterian church, and shows tremendous love for the patients that she cares for. When she was a child, she lost both of her parents at a young age, and well understands the impact that the love of neighbors and family made in caring for her after her loss. Her current HBC patients include women and men suffering from full-blown AIDS; a mother (32) on ARVs, but yet paralyzed for life from spinal tuberculosis, and orphaned children struggling after the death of a parent.

Join me in Praying for the Amangwe Community

Praise God for the land granted us and the new building that we’ve managed to put up!
Pray for an end to the stigma and denial surrounding HIV/AIDS in the Amangwe community – For courageous local people to come forward and openly talk about the huge devastation of AIDS in their community.
Pray for God’s provision and equipping of Thembalethu as we move forward in the work God has called us to do.
Pray for health, provision and hope for the many sick adults and orphaned children in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Pray for provision and wisdom as we move forward to establish Thembalethu Care Centre as a place of hope and love in the midst of Amangwe Tribal Area.
Pray for the HBC mommas that they would continue to be encouraged by God’s word and the fellowship of other believers to continue to deepen in their faith journeys.
Pray that God would build up strong, godly Christian leaders for the Amangwe community.

Jargon Buster

Adherence Training - The required three-module (three day) training given to HIV+ people who are on their way to accessing ART. The three modules cover topics including basic HIV, healthy living with HIV, and ARV adherence. The focus of the third module is to emphasize the need for the patient to takes his/her ARV medication according to the prescribed schedule.

AIDS - Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome; starts out as HIV, then becomes AIDS as the immune system damage becomes evident and opportunistic infections arise. document.

ARV(s) - Anti-retroviral(s) the multi-drug cocktail of treatment for AIDS that converts it from a terminal to chronic condition.

CD4 count- The measure of immune system strength through a blood test. If below 200, the patient can access ARVs immediately, if above 200, the patient must watch their health closely, and recheck their CD4 regularly.

Drug Resistance - Poor adherence to ART can lead to a public-health emergency where HIV virus mutates to develop a strain resistant to the positive effects of the treatment.

Gogo - [Zulu] grandmother

HBC - Home-Based Care, a grassroots network of (mostly) mommas who voluntarily look after the sick and orphaned in their community. With good training, they can be the eyes of the community to identify possible HIV/AIDS patients, motivate and assist them in receiving support and treatment. They also have the potential of remaining life-long treatment supporters of their patients on ARVs to ensure good adherence to the treatment.

HIV - Human Immuno-deficiency Virus, a virus that attacks the immune system of a person. It often lives in the body of an infected person for years before it shows any symptoms.

Opportunistic Infections - Infections that take advantage of the body's weak immune system. Some of the most common in South Africa are tuberculosis, meningitis, pneumonia, and oral thrush.

TB - Tuberculosis, is a disease most commonly infecting the lungs, and the number-one killer of HIV+ people. TB has been around for centuries and today infects one-third of the world’s population, killing almost two million people a year.