Tibet - Health Assistance and Medical Care Access to Remote Rural Areas

Project name: Health Assistance and Medical Care Access to Remote Rural Areas
Status: in progress
Start date: September 2006
End date: 2011
Budget: $51'600 (for 2008)
Project initiators: Graziella Zanoletti, Marcia Schmidt from Yangdzom Healing Hands and Carroll Dunham
Sponsor: Elite Rent-a-Car
Donors: Leda Fletcher, Antoine De Palma, André Pringo, Alliance Limousine, ASD location, Dr. Aleya Hammad, Christiane Morel and Jean-Louis Heritier
Contact and information: go to the contact page 
Donations: go to the donations page

This project addresses a precarious situation in the Amdo and Kham regions, situated in eastern Tibet on the border with China. The Amdo area is His Holiness The Dalaï Lama's native home.

In these rural regions, health care hardly exists and lack of medical assistance and basic hygiene structures make the situation even worse. The government does not take care of the basic needs of local populations, and the only clinics are monastic ones. The nuns from the local monasteries live in very difficult conditions and assistance in health training and access to medicine (Tibetan and Western) are crucial to ensure that they can provide sanitary services to the population.

The nuns also practice the art of Tibetan yoga, the Toumo, which, through body adaptation to the cold, allows the body to strengthen its defences against illnesses. The assistance provided by this project will allow the nuns to teach Toumo to locals, thereby increasing the impact of health assistance and access to medicine.

The first phase of the project was put into action during a trip to Dechen Ling in the Nanchen area, in September 2006. Five monasteries were visited and the accomplishments of the trip were encouraging. We managed to train 2 nuns or monks as health care workers in each monastery. The training included basic diagnosis and treatment of common, uncomplicated medical problems, and it was decided to expand training in the future. We also provided Tibetan and Western medicines and medical supplies for one year, and investigated the possibility of establishing clinics in each monastery. In addition, we gave financial aid to elderly and poor people.

In September 2007 the second yearly medical trip was undertaken by the Ted Wordcester and Yangdzom Healing Hands team, and it far exceeded all expectations for success and achievement. This time 9 monasteries and nunneries were visited, and candidates in each were enrolled for a 3 month training program for medical workers, which will take place in Jyeku in 2008. Clinic building in the monasteries was checked and deemed to be progressing satisfactorily. Once again we gave money for a year's worth of medicine, funds for the poor and elderly, and we carried additional Western medicine as well as distributed reading glasses to old monks, nuns and lay people. 

Each monastery and nunnery welcomed our team graciously. The appreciation for this project is constant and we are repeatedly requested not to abandon this work. 

More information about the origin of this project can be found in this article written in the summer of 2007 by Graziella Zanoletti - Download PDF. 

Maurice Daubard took part in the 2006 expedition to Tibet and wrote an account of his experience - Download PDF (sorry, French only).