Read more about the amazing accomplishments last  with the Rose Sri Lanka 2011 bulletin.

1) Study history:   It puts the present situation into context. Worse situations have occurred many times before

2) Avoid the news:  Editors believe bad news sells better than good. Neither do many hesitate to exaggerate

3) Spend more time with the young:  Age and experience make too many older people cynical and at times melancholy

4) Remain rational :  The worst almost never happens

5) Avoid pessimists:  Keep the company of sunny characters

6) Read the Stoics:  Writers such as Marcus Aurelius have given uplifting advice for hundreds of years

7) Admit mistakes and move on ; We all make bad decisions at times. Don’t dwell on them. Recognize them, learn,  and move on

8)  Keep busy:  dynamic individuals don’t have time to become depressed nor are interested in doing so

9) Get fit:  physical exercise is an excellent antidote for stress. Endorphins help banish the blues

10) Focus on small wins:   we all have little victories every day

11) Ignore events over which you have no control:   worrying about such things, such as what will happen to the Euro,  is a waste of intellectual effort.

12) Concentrate on your own micro-economy: forget the macroeconomic climate.

13) Laugh:  seek out comedy when you can.  Don’t take yourself too seriously

Haiti for me was an emotional rollercoaster. A land of despair, poverty, mayhem but also a land of hope, optimism and pride. These last 3 sentiments are what stick with me as I reflect on my experience. After all, it is the people that leave an impact on you.

In December the girls were able to carry out this campaign in two locations. One was conducted at Prey Veng provincial pedagogy.  There were 116 people in attendance, 32 females and 84 males. Of these people, 18 were from District office of education, 10 were school directors,1 was from the health department, 3 from provincial dept of education, 3 from POSVY, 19 disabled students from the University, 10 Disabled students from High School and 50 Disabled teacher from Prey Veng province.

On this occasion, some 300 villagers were screened, and over 100 referred to the Sight Centre for sight restoration or blindness prevention .

Despite the events of 2002 the Sight Centre has treated, surgically, medically or optometrically over 100,000 Cambodians since that time, the vast majority too poor to be able to afford treatment by the medical system.

The sight center is still in need of funding for these outreach trips, please donate so we can keep them going.

In the end of November, Rose Charities went down to Haiti for a third nursing course for nurses and doctors. Rose provides training on neonatal care, teaching the nurse educators up to date methods. By teaching the teachers – we are able to reach a large amount of future nurses without spending too much. We were also able to send new french/english text books to replace the outdated books. We were also able to send new equipment for the hospitals.

After Lek’s first year of study her family was struck by tragedy when her father died. Lek’s sister became the head of the household. She had two children and her husband soon left to remarry. Lek’s sister also died and Lek was then left to look after her sister’s two children and her mother alone. With sponsorship Lek feels like she can study and gain employment  which would provide a stable and more sustainable future for her family.

Lek was born with her left leg missing below the knee and could only crawl – at the age of 17 months her father made her an artificial leg from thread spools and kapok branches – with some difficulty, Lek managed to walk with the aid of the home-made prosthesis for 5 months. At this time, Lek’s parents heard about the Calmette Hospital in Phnom Penh and made the arduous and expensive trip to the city to try to get a proper prosthesis fitted.

Lek is very proud of her prosthesis and wears it all the time, she is now not hindered by her disability and can carry water, climb trees, plant rice, fish, ride bicycles, tend cattle and go to school as well help with household chores like any other Cambodian child.

Ka Lek before her prosthesis was fitted by VI in 1997

Ka Lek cooking her lunch after returning from school at the Supportive Home in Prey Veng Town

In providing funds to contribute to this area of our work you are assisting us to improve the quality of healthcare services within the hospital and minimise the level of disability incurred through patient managment. Our physiotherapists work on the hospital wards, consulting with local Doctors and encouraging physiotherapy referrals in necessary cases.

One recent example of where our physiotherapists were instrumental in reducing disability was when a young patient who had sustained an ankle fracture and was immobile in bed in the hospital for several days, prior to being referred to physiotherapy. When physiotherapy finally attended to this young lady (a gap in services that physio took so long to reach this woman which has been addressed), she was found to have a nasty pressure sore on the heel of her foot and significant muscle deconditioning. When these issues were raised with the doctors, the response was ‘no problem’, which we at RCRC believe is a big problem! RCRC therapist went on to appropriately cast the injured leg, accomodating for the pressure sore, relieve pressure on the sore to encourage healing, and mobilised the young lady with crutches and began re-conditioning exercises. The result is that the sore healed well (these can potentially develop into very nasty wounds that fail to heal) and she was able to mobilise independently on crutches and go home safely with maximum function maintained.

Our clinical services also extend to the community, with staff providing patient-centred rehabilitation sessions in people’s homes, ensuring rehab is appropriate and beneficial and minimsing cost and difficulty for the families.

People with disabilities in Cambodia are known to experience even greater barriers to accessing health care than non-disabled Cambodians. Our way of clinical service provision aims to address these barriers and encourage better health care for all, especially those with disabilities. Our clincal work not only aims to provide quality care for Cambodians, but also to reduce and prevent disability.

Cancer incidence in developing countries is increasing at a staggering rate. The disease now kills more people in those countries than malaria, AIDs and tuberculosis combined.   But a Global Task Force  on Expanded Access to Cancer Care and Control in Developing Countries  (GTF.CCC) released a report in November (2011) showing that by using affordable and readily available drugs, more than 2.4 million lives could be saved each year.

While medical effort have increased survival from infectious diseases in developing countries, this has not been the same for cancer where  the increased survival has meant a greater predisposition to contracting the illnesses of the richer countries, cancer, cardiovascular disease and diabetes.

According to the report of GTF.CCC, 26 out of 29 key drugs that could treat the most prevalent and curable cancers are now off-patient. People could receive a course of treatment for less than $100.

In Canada the survival rate for childhood leukemia is around 90%, In low-income countries it is around 10%. Access to drugs would increase this dramatically.  A couple of  hundred million dollars (the cost of 100 cruise missiles) would treat all of these childhood leukemias.