National Nurses United

"It was shocking to us that she was walk- ing around," said Reeves-Mason. "We paid for transportation to take her to the hospital which was an hour away from Agbozume and for her hospital bills." The nurses left money for her, arranged for her to receive insulin supplies, and trained a community health worker to use a glucometer and test strips. Local communi- ty health workers will monitor her progress and make sure she receives the medications she needs. Education about healthcare is as critical- ly important as receiving healthcare servic- es, so the nurses focused much of their time on educating people. "The knowledge base is very low, even among the affluent," said Obasi. "They have money, they go to the hospital, but they don't know how to take care for themselves. We hear stories of young people dying because they didn't have the knowledge." "We are ambassadors and advocates," Asante-Totimeh said. "We are educating the middle class and the wealthy as well as the poor. People just don't have the knowledge to deal with their health problems." They met some people who were skip- ping or taking lower doses of their prescrip- tions to make them last longer. "We are from African countries, so we know what is going on in the health system there," said Asante-Totimeh. "We have fami- lies there. We wanted to go back, assess the needs of people, and empower them with health resources so they can be better educated about healthcare." Obasi was the inspiration for the mission. She is a veteran of many medical missions to African countries through an international nonprofit she founded, the African Community Health Initiative, which provides quality healthcare to communities in Nigeria and Namibia that lack access to basic health services. All say the experience was "life changing." "It pushed us to leave our comfort zone and be living waters to a community in desperate need of help," said Asante- Totimeh. "We cannot fathom the pain and suffering among the extremely poor and neglected who heard we were coming, but did not have any form of transportation to get to our location. That is very saddening!" "The trip was an eye-opener to all the service available in the United States," said Antwi. "As a case manager, I work to assist patients irrespective of if they have health insurance, but the community we served had no health advocates. If I could afford it, I would go back monthly." "What we take for granted here today are things many in Africa are grateful for when they get them," said Reeves-Mason. "We as nurses are grateful for what we do every day at work in our community, but we want to branch out to help people on the African continent who need our help too." "It was very fulfilling," said Obasi. "Knowledge attained without using it is wasted. We want to effect change for other people." The trip to Ghana was the group's first international mission. A second is planned for Kenya in 2019. The trip was sponsored by members of African Nurses United, coworkers from United Hospital, friends, and family. The African Community Health Initia- tive (ACHI) will be going on its next mission trip to Nigeria in November while the African Nurses United's second internation- al trip will be early 2019. They are still looking for financial support for their medical mission costs. The nurses paid much of the cost of the Ghana trip, including their plane tickets. —Barb Brady M A R C H | A P R I L 2 0 1 8 W W W . N A T I O N A L N U R S E S U N I T E D . O R G N A T I O N A L N U R S E 5 Visit the African Nurses United's Facebook page to learn more about contributing www.facebook.com/ theafricannursesunited/ You can help their partner African Community Health Initiative at www.achicares.org.

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