Surveys Begin.

Health surveys are one of the many pieces of gathering information that will help to best inform the development of the health care system. I have been working on designing a survey that will give us a clear profile of what people want from local health care and what challenges people are currently facing so that we can move forward with programs and applying for strategic partnerships, ie funding. Today we began the process.

It is really an honor to go to someone's home and sit with them for 30 minutes or so while they share their family history and hopes for the future of health in the New City. Even though I cannot understand most of it until a fellow translates for me, there is a lot to be gleaned from the animated tones and gesturing of the dialogue. Here is the order of operations: We go and introduce ourselves. Usually there is a fellow who leads the conversation in Igbo and I chime in with words like Dalu and Naan, which are standard greetings. After giving a brief overview of where we are in the project design, we offer to give them a family photo if they are willing to answer our questions. In this process, benches appear out of nowhere. They are long smooth wooden benches made from a single long plank with keyhole-type joints (no nails or screws). The children will carry them inside from outside if we are invited in. Or the adults will magically produce benches and stools to sit in the area of swept dirt outside the front door of their waddle-and-daub hut. The benches are dusted off and we sit.

The eight page survey takes about 30-minutes. When a man asked why we were asking all these questions because he thought I should know these things as a doctor, the fellow replied in Igbo that we have different diseases where I come from and so it is important to know what people here go through. It was a delicate situation handled well, although the statement is only partially true. Some of the diseases are different than what people experience at home, malaria typhoid guinea worm, but many of the diseases are the same, hypertension diabetes back pain. The conditions that produce the disease are different, but the human body has a limited set of responses that link us no matter where we are in the world. We are all human after all.

After going through the myriad questions, many of the families are pleased with the opportunity to have their photo taken. 'A snap' is the proper Nigerian term for the snapshot we take. To have a photo properly printed, one must trave 90 minutes to Onitsha and I can only imagine the hassle of actually locating a place that will print photos once you arrive there. This doesn't account for the fact that very few people have cameras. Almost everyone has a cell phone though, and many cellphones have cameras so the concept is not foreign. People get excited and dress up for the photos, and the photos are honest. They show families sitting in front of thatched roofs, women holding their children, and beautiful austere faces of people who are all hoping for a future that will provide relief from some of life's challenges.