Malnourished babies
In early November Karin and Susan began scheming about how to expand the pre-existing baby milk supplementation program. This program mostly exists to help family members after a mother has died, leaving a small baby. If the child is showing signs of being underweight or malnourished, they would receive some baby formula to help the child back on the road of health.
However, the more children Susan began to see in clinic, some of these children, of weaning age, were showing signs of malnutrition and even babies were in worse condition than had been previously treated.
So, through a combination of materials they have come up with a four-fold plan to take malnourished children from a pure liquid diet to a gradually more and more protein-enriched diet. Agnes, Fanwell's wife, is being trained to make the food, tell families what foods they can give children to supplement their diets and help to prevent malnutrition in the future.
It was quite a journey with Daniel (15) checking Susan's (26) math- usually he was right! According to our first calculations, we almost bought 500 cans of milk and 1000 kgs of sugar for one month for 40+ babies. We ended up only needing 18 cans of milk and 30 kgs of sugar in one month... :) But let me tell you, we all spent hours going over and over those calculations!
Originally the liquid diet was made up in full beforehand and given out for two weeks at a time. However, before the two weeks were up the mothers began to come back with fermented food due to the heat! Too, the liquid diet requires several large containers per baby, not easy to get where we are. The caregivers were asked to bring the containers back to exchange- and lo and behold they did and we were never short!
The babies are monitored every few weeks (depending on how malnourished they are), weighed, and checked out by Susan when necessary. Then, they are charted and their diet is re-evaluated. They even get a new set of clothes from donations we receive.
Kazitu was the first success story. A scrawny baby, he graduated from a pure liquid diet to the next level! Currently all the babies and malnourished children have graduated from the pure liquid diet!
While we began by making up the food ourselves and letting our Zambian workers help, now Agnes and others are beginning to make the food on their own with few instructions.
However, the more children Susan began to see in clinic, some of these children, of weaning age, were showing signs of malnutrition and even babies were in worse condition than had been previously treated.
So, through a combination of materials they have come up with a four-fold plan to take malnourished children from a pure liquid diet to a gradually more and more protein-enriched diet. Agnes, Fanwell's wife, is being trained to make the food, tell families what foods they can give children to supplement their diets and help to prevent malnutrition in the future.
It was quite a journey with Daniel (15) checking Susan's (26) math- usually he was right! According to our first calculations, we almost bought 500 cans of milk and 1000 kgs of sugar for one month for 40+ babies. We ended up only needing 18 cans of milk and 30 kgs of sugar in one month... :) But let me tell you, we all spent hours going over and over those calculations!
Originally the liquid diet was made up in full beforehand and given out for two weeks at a time. However, before the two weeks were up the mothers began to come back with fermented food due to the heat! Too, the liquid diet requires several large containers per baby, not easy to get where we are. The caregivers were asked to bring the containers back to exchange- and lo and behold they did and we were never short!
The babies are monitored every few weeks (depending on how malnourished they are), weighed, and checked out by Susan when necessary. Then, they are charted and their diet is re-evaluated. They even get a new set of clothes from donations we receive.
Kazitu was the first success story. A scrawny baby, he graduated from a pure liquid diet to the next level! Currently all the babies and malnourished children have graduated from the pure liquid diet!
While we began by making up the food ourselves and letting our Zambian workers help, now Agnes and others are beginning to make the food on their own with few instructions.
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on Thursday, December 13, 2007 at 7:40 AM.
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