Nurses For Edna & Medical Aid Films

Medical Aid films,(MCF) a London based organization, is donating a collection of Maternal & Child training videos, in the Somali language, to our NURSES for EDNA team who will travel to Somaliland in August on an educational medical mission.

MCF’s vision is to deliver a solution to needless maternal and infant deaths: a global library of films for people engaged in health training and education in areas of urgent need.

They work with local NGOs & existing organizations to enable their films to reach the people who need them, and give them the opportunity to feedback on the impact of the film. NURSES for EDNA will use the videos in training sessions and then leave them at the hospital for future use. In this way, as the folks at MCF say, “ Our films can be watched time and time again!”

A huge THANK YOU from One Nurse to everyone at Medical Aid films for the wonderful work that you do!

To check out more about MCF go here

Cheers, 

ONAAT

Nurses for Edna has a new addition - Kerra Plesko.

Canadian nurse, Kerra Plesko, RN joins the team, Nurses for Edna traveling to Hargeisa, Somaliland in August. She replaces nurse, Beth Langlais who is unable to participate in the mission this year due to personal circumstances.

Kerra grew up in a small town in Northern British Columbia. She graduated from the University of Northern British Columbia in Prince George, British Columbia in 2007.

A certified perinatal nurse, Kerra is currently working as a RN in a Maternity unit in Prince George where she is responsible for antepartum, Labor &Delivery and postpartum care. Kerra also serves as a preceptor for new nurses.  

Kerra is a  seasoned traveler having spent time in Thailand and south Korea as well as most of North America and has traveled “All over Europe.” This will be the first, of what she hopes are many, medical missions for Kerra. She has a passion for travelling and is ecstatic to combine her love of travel with her passion towards women's healthcare.

“I’m looking forward to getting out and seeing what medicine is like across the world, said Kerra. ‘I know what it’s like in Canada; I know what it’s like in the States, but I don’t know how it is across the world and I so think it’s important to see  how things are done in different areas. If you can either pull from their strengths, or learn from their weaknesses. I’m excited to see how another culture does L & D and I really excited to see how a different culture handles the same thing we do. I am excited to teach them what I know and learn from them what they know.”

“ I’ve always had a dream of nursing in South Africa and together with One Nurse At  A Time and amazing sponsors like Barco’s Nightingales Foundation, that dream is coming true! Thank you so much!”

Edna Adan Maternity Hospital - NURSES for EDNA - Fundraising Event

One Nurse At A Time is sending a team of nurses to Hargeisa, Somaliland on a first medical mission to The Edna Adan Maternity Hospital. The nursing team, NURSES for EDNA,  are working hard to fund-raise for the much needed equipment and supplies for the hospital. 

One  nurse,  Kimberly Law,  has organized a fund raiser to be held at The Barley Mill Brew Pub in Penticton, BC on June 29.

5:00PM – Door Prizes

6:00PM Food

8:00PM Live Music (Uncorked)

Only $15.  Come out and show your support! Bring all your friends!


Thank you,

ONAAT

Mosby's 3rd Annual Superheroes Nursing Contest

Our very own, Sue Averill,RN, BSN, MBA and Co-founder and President of One Nurse At  A Time has been nominated for Mosby's Third annual SUPERHEROES of NURSING contest. Winners will be announced in October.

Sue Averill, RN, MBA, considers herself a “humanitarian snowbird.” While she works half the year in the emergency department of a large metropolitan hospital, she spends the other 6 months volunteering abroad. Her travels read like an atlas.

When she returned from each trip, friends, acquaintances, and even perfect strangers would ask, “How can I do what you're doing?" Sue always found time to chat and guide them along their path. Then, she decided to answer these questions not only for friends and colleagues, but for all nurses! She co-founded a non-profit organization, ONE NURSE AT A TIME, (One Nurse) in 2007 and continues us to serve as President for the organization. Her goal is to make it easier for nurses to use their skills around the world

 Over years of trying to expand her own volunteer experiences, Sue had become acutely aware that there was no central database/website to inform nurses about volunteer opportunities. The information available on the Internet was available only in bits and pieces. It became a priority to create a central database as part of the One Nurse website; this database is updated annually to assure it remains current and correct.

Although the majority of Americans have some understanding of what nurses do in the United States—working in clinics, hospitals, nursing homes, and the community—most of them have no idea what nurses do when they volunteer abroad. International volunteering involves a wide breadth of work: teaching, diagnosing and treating, and functioning as hospital administrators and logisticians. They, like medical MacGyver’s, must wear many hats and stretch far beyond their scope of practice at home. Sue wants the public to recognize the great value that even one single nurse brings to a mission, to a people in need, so networking is a huge part of the One Nurse organization. Representatives speak at public forums, maintain an active presence on Internet social networks, write articles, and publish articles and stories. 

Doing volunteer work, by definition, doesn't pay. Many, if not most, international organizations ask nurses to pay their own costs. Because Sue wanted to overcome that barrier so that more nurses could share their skills and expertise in the world, they created a One Nurse scholarship program that offers $1000 to qualified applicants.  

  When discussing why she has put so much effort into building a nonprofit organization for nurses Sue says,”The key for me came during a surgical trip to Pakistan – by comparison to girls and women there, I have lived a charmed life. I was born in a time and place that fosters independence, education and freedom for women. I believe it to be my responsibility to give of myself for the many gifts that I have received through no merit of my own. My goal is to make it easier for nurses to use their skills to help people around the world, to lower the entry barriers, to increase public awareness of the role and contribution nurses make in the humanitarian world. I truly believe we CAN change the world. “

Now if Sue Averill isn't a Nursing Superhero, I don’t know who is!

Nurses for Edna - Emily Scott

One Nurse At A time and Nurses for Edna welcomes our newest volunteer nurse: Emily Scott, RN, BSN, PCCN. Emily became aware of the Nurses for Edna team on Facebook and knew immediately she wanted to become involved.  For now she is volunteering by helping to complete the “Wish List” of equipment and supplies Edna Adan has requested for the hospital in Hargeisia, and she hopes to be able to participate in a future Nurses for Edna medical mission.

Emily was born and raised in Seattle, Washington. She spent four years in sunny Southern California earning her Bachelor’s degree in Peace Studies from Chapman University. While spending one summer serving at a clinic in the slums of Nairobi, Kenya, she met a group of volunteer nurses and immediately realized her calling. She finished her degree and returned to Seattle to pursue nursing, hoping to combine the two fields to affect positive change in neglected areas of the world.

Since that experience in Kenya stole her heart, Emily has returned to volunteer in Africa four more 

times. While in nursing school, she organized a service trip to Kibera, the largest slum in Africa, with her fellow students. After she gained a couple of years of hospital work experience at home, Emily and her husband quit their jobs and left for East Africa to volunteer and adventure as long as their savings would hold out. She spent four months working at a maternity hospital in Tanzania, delivering babies without electricity, running water, or doctors. Since returning to Seattle in early 2013, she has been working as a labor and delivery nurse at Providence Medical Center.” I am very passionate about maternal health and, like many others, I was deeply inspired by Edna Adan after reading her story in Half the Sky, “said Emily. “I have taken 5 trips to volunteer in East Africa over the last several years, most recently spending four months at a maternity clinic in Arusha, Tanzania. It would be a dream come true for me to volunteer at Edna's hospital, but for now I want to do anything I can to support the team going in August.”

Everyone at One Nurse At A Time, especially the Nurses for Edna team wishes to extend a hearty welcome to Emily Scott. Working together we are changing the world….one nurse at a time.