The Deaf Women Aloud initiative (DWAI) has disclosed project plan to develop a sign-language booklet on Sexual and Reproductive Health (SRH) for hospitals, in order to ease communication between healthworkers and deaf women to enable them exercise their sexual and reproductive health rights without barriers.
Its Executive Director, Hellen Udoye Beyioku-Alase stated this Monday in Abuja when she led a delegation on an advocacy visit to the Kubwa General Hospital to intimate and seek support/input of the hospital on the project.
Beyioku-Alase stressed the need for healthworkers to understand sign-language, saying this would go a long way in addressing the health challenges of deaf people in the country.
“We recently trained some healthworkers from different hospitals in Abuja on sign-language and we appreciate the Kubwa General Hospital support and encouragement in this regard, but we want more healthworkers to understand the signlanguage.
” Phase two of our project we are working with other NGO’s to produce a booklet on sexual and reproductive health rights for the deaf and the hospital is our major stakeholders in this, thats why we are here,” she said.
“We are developing a sign language booklet and whatever is going into the book should be ideas from doctors, nurses, midviwes. We want you to recommend the nursing staff particularly those in the reproductive health department to be part of the project.
“This book will go a long in curbing some of our challenges particularly in accessing healthcare services,” she added.
Responding, the Medical Director (MD) Kubwa General Hospital, Muideen Lasisi, lauded the initiative stressing the need for inclusiveness of everybody if the universal health coverage must be achieved in the country.
Muideen also emphasised the importance of understanding of sign-language by healhworkers, saying this will enable better communication and better healthcare service delivery to deaf people in the country.
According to him, developing a booklet of sign-language for healthworkers is a laudable goal that is set for health agenda, assuring that the hospital will give the needed support to ensure that the goal is well achieved
He said “inclusiveness of everybody is important and this will make health coverage to reach everywhere and everybody.
“We thank you for considering kubwa general hospital as a viable place to start the project and we are absolutly committed to making sure that you realize the objective of this your initiative because we are involved in reproductive health to a very large extent and have services around reproductive health such as, family planning clinic, ante natal clinic, labour ward, post abortion clinic etc,” he assured.
Earlier, the Assistant Director Nursing Services Habiba Umar said that Deaf people are important people just like everyone in the society, assuring that the nurses are committed to learning how to communicate better with them.
“We want them to mingle with us just like we mingle with every other person so it is a pleasure that the sign language training/initiative came to our facility,” she said.
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