HMBC Newsletter – October 2017

 

On the 1st of November 2016, we received our first HMBC Mobile Clinic. This was made possible by Turn The Tide, Wilde Ganzen and Jeffrey’s Bay Windfarm. Schroeder Motorhomes did a fantastic job building the quantum into a clinic. It is fitted with an adult & baby scale, examination bed, toilet and portable sonar machine. We are keeping it green with solar panels on the roof to charge the batteries. The HMBC Mobile Clinic will get to the more remote areas of our community and reach out to the most vulnerable ones. It will provide antenatal check-ups, family planning (contraceptives), postnatal home visits, vaccinations, weight assessments and crèche visits.

We are very excited to announce the opening of HMBC Journey. Significant needs emerged from the youth visiting our clinic on a regular basis and discussions with regard to pregnancy-related crisis issues took place with our own personnel. Due to the volume of these issues and the special need for counselling, it was proposed to establish a pregnancy crisis centre. A space was found in Humansdorp, close to the hospital and many high schools. HMBC Journey reaches out to vulnerable women who find themselves facing any pregnancy-related crisis. God gave us all a free will to choose and the women coming to HMBC Journey must make their own choices. We believe an informed choice is a responsible choice. An unplanned pregnancy can be a crisis situation and we offer help and support through love and acceptance, prayer and counselling. We also do counselling for clients who suffered any pregnancy-related loss e.g. abortion, stillbirth or miscarriage. Thandi Radebe heads up HMBC Journey and she has a dedicated team with trained up counsellors.

 

In October 2016, HMBC started our first antenatal group check up’s. This is a very effective program that is used in the Netherlands in midwife practices. Margot van Dijk, a volunteer midwife from the Netherlands, helped with the start-up of the groups. The aim is to connect pregnant women together, spend time with them and let them educate each other, following the principle “Tell me and I will forget, teach me and I remember, involve me and I will learn”. The group consist of around 12 women of the same pregnancy age that meet together monthly. Each session is facilitated by one of our midwives and nurse assistant. The program allows the women to interact and talk and share experiences about healthy lifestyle, relationships, contraception, breastfeeding, birth and being a mother. The sessions include a check-up, where the women will be able to take their own blood pressure and weight.  This will involve them in their own body changes and will make them more responsible for their own health. The women who have attended the group check up’s have responded very positively and it is a safe place to share their hearts with each other in the group.

 

Meet Sister Carin Espag, our brand new team member. Sr. Carin is originally from Pretoria where she studied Nursing at SA Lourens College, after getting her degree she worked at HF Verwoerd Hospital and then later on at Clinton Hospital where she was attending to the premature babies in the NICU. Sr. Carin will be attending to the post-natal side of HMBC where she will be helping Sr. Lynette with the babies for the vaccinations and family planning for the mothers. She will also be on the mobile clinic, which has been going out to the community. Besides working with babies which is one of her passions, she has recently become an “Ouma” to her first grandchild this year and loves her role as she gets to spend time with her family here in Jeffrey’s Bay.

 

And if all of the above was not enough; we opened our own HMBC Shop. The shop is stocked up with second hand clothes for babies and children, pregnancy clothes and baby accessories.  HMBC wanted to give the mothers of the community the opportunity to buy clothing with their limited amount of funds and on the same hand be a source of income towards the running costs of the clinic. Now you know where you can bring your baby and pregnancy clothes or any baby accessories.

 

HMBC has been running an HMBC local Hero Campaign for the clinic. This gives our local community an opportunity to invest in the clinic and with all the services it provides to the Kouga community. HMBC is a Non-Profit organisation which runs solely on donations for the upkeep of the clinic’s running costs.  Unlike government clinic‘s, HMBC does not get any financial contribution towards the salaries, expenses etc. 
 

Become a LOCAL HERO today in 3 easy steps:

 

1) Visit HMBC.co.za/Donate

2) Download & fill out an debit order form and email / fax it to us

OR

3) Do an EFT with our banking details as below:
 

Account Name: Victory Medical Trust
Bank: First Nation Bank
Branch: Jeffreys Bay
Branch Code: 210515
Account Number: 62228278091
Swift Code: FIRNZAJJ

Waaalllllaaa!!!  Your a Hero!!!!!

 

Many of you have journeyed with the HMBC over the years and see how it has grown from strength to strength. As you have noticed, we have been working on our ‘look’, online as well as on-site and found ways to tell our story. This newsletter is one of them and will assist in keeping you in the loop of what is happening. We are not trying to impress you with all the good work we do, but rather testify of what God can do with our small doings. Someone said the other day, our little step of obedience allows God to make a big step on our behalf. We are continually humbled by the goodness of our God. We thank you for your faithful support. If you are new to the HMBC family, welcome! Please subscribe to our newsletter or give us a like on Facebook.