Ramakrishna Mission’s mobile health unit is on the road, thanks to the members of Parnell and Auckland Harbourside Rotary clubs. The vehicles commissioning has fulfilled a long held ambition by the Ramakrishna Mission’s President Swami Tadananda to provide a health service to the rural communities living in the vicinity of Nadi
In 2019 a chance conversation between President Elect of Nadi Rotary Krupesh Patel, and Parnell Rotary member and District Governor Elect Ingrid Waugh, led to the establishment of a project and ongoing relationship with Ramakrishna Mission in Fiji and especially the Sarada Medical Centre.
With huge input from the President of Ramakrishna Mission Fiji Swami Tadananda,, a small project team of Rotarians from Parnell and Auckland Harbourside Rotary clubs worked together with other Rotary clubs and external organisations to raise the NZD110,000 to get a Mobile Medical Clinic on the road in Nadi, Fiji. The Fiji Ministry of Health and Medical Services is also a key partner, providing staff for the mobile clinic.
The new clinic had its first outing in February 2020, although for now it is in lockdown due to the necessary focus of the Sarada Medical Clinic on treating patients only at its Nadi clinic during the C 19 epidemic.
Ramakrishna Mission is a worldwide organisation that focuses on providing primarily educational and medical services to people in need. The Ramakrishna Mission Fiji is a registered charitable trust that has been serving in Fiji since the 1930’s. As well as a large school and a vocational training centre, it operates the Sarada Medical Centre in Nadi which provides free health services to the poor and needy.
This mobile clinic will provide preventative primary healthcare to more than 90,000 people in the wider Nadi area to address the non-communicable diseases (NCD) crisis which is responsible for 80% of deaths in Fiji. The figures for NCDs, like high blood pressure, diabetes, cancer, heart disease, cataracts, are frightening – 3 amputations of limbs a day, heart attacks becoming common when people are in the 20s and 30s, and seen as normal in their 50s.
The vehicle was sourced and fitted out to be a customised clinic, staffed with a range of health practitioners including a doctor, nurse, dietitian, physiotherapist, educator. They will work with already established Zone nurses and Community Health Workers, and will use technology to assist in record keeping and data analysis.
We look forward to seeing it back on the road as soon as possible, launching it officially, and continuing to support the Mission in its work in health promotion and disease prevention.
