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The episode shares Ishmael's inspiring journey from pain to healing through the compassionate care provided by Mercy UMC Hospital. Listeners learn how community support and dedicated healthcare professionals can create incredible transformations in children's lives.

• Ishmael's broken body and his mother's desperate journey for help
• Dr. Morie Vandi’s commitment to serving underserved communities
• Mercy's outreach program and how important it is in providing medical care to rural areas where poverty is extreme
• The successful surgical intervention for Ishmael's hernia
• The fusion of medical care and emotional support during recovery
• Ishmael’s joyful transformation post-surgery and his aspirations for the future
• Our young Co-host's perspective and her uplifting message about kindness and community impact

If you enjoyed this episode, don't forget to subscribe, share it with your friends and leave a review. Together, we can bring more stories of hope to life.

More about our guest: https://www.helpingchildrenworldwide.org/latestnews/introducing-dr-morie-vandi-mercy-hospitals-newest-physician
More about Mercy Hospital:
https://www.helpingchildrenworldwide.org/mercy-hospital.html

How you can support crucial health services for children like Ishmael.
https://www.helpingchildrenworldwide.org/give-998668.html

Support the health mission for children just like Ishmael.

https://donate.helpingchildrenworldwide.org/campaigns/3521-mercy-hospital

https://donate.helpingchildrenworldwide.org/campaigns/36787-maternal-health-matters

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Welcome to the first episode of Season of the Optimistic Voices podcast of Helping Children Worldwide. This is a REBROADCAST of Episode 1, Season 3, because we are once again heading to West Africa on this collaborative mission to save the lives of mothers and infants - and going upstream in our mission to prevent unnecessary orphanhoods from occurring.

We help children worldwide by strengthening and Empowering Families and communities. This podcast is for people interested in deep conversations with thought leaders in the field of child welfare, global health and international missions to the global South.

Our special host for this episode is Kathleen Pfohl, the maternal health mission graduate intern with Helping Children Worldwide., along with guests Josephine Garnem, Executive Director of Healy International Relief Foundation and Dr. Mariama Massaquoi, co-founder of Tenki for Born, which she runs together with her siblings as a way for members of the diaspora to recognize and give back to the communities where their families and ancestors were born. Dr. Masaquoi is a family medicine doctor based in Virginia. Mariama, and a guest on a prior episode of Optimistic Voices, where she discussed the Mission of Tenki for Born. Tenki for Born is dedicated to alleviating maternal mortality. Helping Children Worldwide, Healy International and Tenki are members of Together for Global Health, a professional Network convened by Helping Children Worldwide and managed by Yasmine Vaughan, Helping Children Worldwide's Technical Advisor for Global Health and Missions.

During January 2024, the together for Global health network members are hosting a maternal health conference in Sierra Leone, West Africa, training midwives and nurses and focused on creating a cadre of well-trained practitioners who can train others locally in order to sustain the educational impact of the conference, improve continuity of care and capacity of local providers.

The training builds on training provided by CHASL in 2023 and is the first collaboration of a long term plan for training missions to Sierra Leone to bring the educational efforts to every community and region in the country.

The conference outcomes will inform future collaborative endeavors, through monitoring, evaluation and collaborative research on long term impacts of the training.

Support the health mission for children just like Ishmael.

https://donate.helpingchildrenworldwide.org/campaigns/3521-mercy-hospital

https://donate.helpingchildrenworldwide.org/campaigns/36787-maternal-health-matters

Support the show

Helpingchildrenworldwide.org

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Curious about how sustainable development models can transform entire communities? Our latest episode promises to unravel this by sitting down with Melody Curtis, the inspiring Executive Director of Helping Children Worldwide. Discover how her organization transitioned from temporary relief to an empowerment approach, fostering resilient communities and strong families. Melody shares uplifting success stories of families gaining independence, and our program strategist Laura emphasizes the value of local expertise, highlighting the key role communities play in driving long-term change.

Rethinking mission work? We definitely are, and this episode challenges the traditional models of short-term missions. We move beyond task completion to embrace relationship-building and mutual learning. Join us as we recount the experiences of mission teams in Sierra Leone, where medical training and simulations offered deep insights into the challenges faced by local communities. Learn how this shift towards understanding and collaboration leads to a richer, more reciprocal mission experience that empowers both participants and the communities they engage with.

Finally, we dive into the nuances of cross-cultural collaboration and the push towards localization in international development. Our conversation with Melody illuminates the Rising Tide initiative's success in empowering local leaders in Sierra Leone and celebrates 25 years of impactful collaboration. As we look towards 2025, we share our ambitious goals to expand our network and support vulnerable communities even further. With a commitment to justice, mercy, and humility, this episode is a testament to the power of global partnerships and the dedication of everyone involved in this important mission.

Support the health mission for children just like Ishmael.

https://donate.helpingchildrenworldwide.org/campaigns/3521-mercy-hospital

https://donate.helpingchildrenworldwide.org/campaigns/36787-maternal-health-matters

Support the show

Helpingchildrenworldwide.org