West African Fistula Women Given New Hope
Mercy Ships Begins Regular Fistula Operations at New Fistula Clinic

8 JUNE 2005 | FREETOWN, SIERRA LEONE

Today millions of African women suffer with a condition hardly known about in the Western world.  Without access to obstetric care, some women in developing nations spend up to eight days in agonizing labor before finally delivering a still-born child.  And for those who survive, a hole or fistula develops often leaving them incontinent.

	These women were once outcasts, living a life of humiliation and shame. But today, in the wards, singing is heard.

Vesico-vaginal fistula
Vesico-vaginal fistula or VVF is a debilitating affliction causing women to have an unpleasant odor that they’re unable to hide. Husbands often abandon their wives forcing them into a life of isolation, and leaving them to provide for themselves.  About 50,000 to 100,000 new cases occur each year due to a lack of obstetric care.[i] These statistics take on real meaning for women in Sierra Leone, who lack easy access to a doctor.

Co-Founder of the World Wide Fistula Fund and Mercy Ships VVF Program Manager Dr. Steven Arrowsmith explains, “These women will just labor and labor for days.  During that time, the head of the baby down in the pelvis shuts off blood flow to all the pelvic organs, and those organs eventually die and leave large gaps and so the women become completely incontinent of urine and sometimes also stool.”

Aberdeen Clinic and Fistula Center
Mercy Ships, in partnership with the Geneva-based AOG Foundation and the local community is now offering free fistula surgeries to women in Freetown, at the new Aberdeen Clinic and Fistula Center. These women were once outcasts, living a life of humiliation and shame. But today, in the wards, singing is heard – the very same women once abandoned by society, now dance with joy.

	The Aberdeen Clinic and Fistula Center is a beacon of hope for the women of Sierra Leone.

The Aberdeen Clinic and Fistula Center is a beacon of hope for the women of Sierra Leone but there are thousands of women in this country who suffer in silence with this horrendous condition. The volunteer surgeons complete up to three life-changing operations a day, allowing many of the women to have children once again.

“On a daily basis we see women come in, some might have traveled for hours some might have traveled for days. They come shy, not knowing what to expect and you see them leave with a smile on their face.” says Mercy Ships nurse Marianne Lako, “Because not just their fistula was fixed but something else happened – maybe for the first time in years they had somebody put an arm around their shoulder, showed that they cared, that they are special.”

Fistulas disappeared from the Western world over 70 years ago, and with the help of the Aberdeen Clinic and Fistula Center, hundreds of African women experience the promise of a better future.