I love my job - volunteering just works

Written by Alison | 10 October 2010

.. I just received some fantastic news from the folks at NABUUR and the Friends of Arrow Web Hospital. Carolyn has managed to secure the remaining funding to ship the vital medical equipment to Kenya. Funds were offered by COCO, a children’s charity founded by Olympic athlete Steve Cram, who support children throughout the developing world.

(Carolyn sharing a joke with some of the ladies at Arrow Web)

This now means that Aid to Hospitals Worldwide, a fantastic organisation that recycle large item hospital equipment like X-ray machines and surgical tables from UK hospitals and gives them FREE to needy communities around the developing world, can ship almost a full container of vital equipment to the Arrow Web Hospital in Kayole-Soweto. The container will include beds, dental chairs, baby warmers and laboratory equipment and many other essential pieces, the value of which, as new, would be over £58,000 !!!

Bramuel J Simiyu, who tirelessly runs operations at this busy, overwhelmed community hospital and has helped to improve conditions and services on offer dramatically, is among the many staff that will welcome this incredible Gift, allowing the hospital to serve, even better, the thousands of very low income residents of the vast surrounding slum community. Its just so awesome when people come together and just get things done!!! Thank you to everyone involved.

As you'll see on the Friends blog, "Super-Facilitator" Carolyn also managed to convince NHS Grampian to support the Hospital and organised a visit from a small number of key staff. They brought six large bags of medical supplies and baby clothes with them donated by NHS Grampian staff and colleagues in Moray, Scotland. The visit will be the start of a long term relationship between Arrow Kenya and NHS Grampian, forging assistance and further collaboration with all kinds of improvements. Thats just fabulous, especially when you think this all started with me going to a little networking event at Harrogate Community Voluntary Service. It was there that I met Mary, who later became a trustee for AVIF, but who is also the northern representative for A2HW. Along with friends like Deby Atkinson of Paca, who held a ladies evening fundraiser for us we're now hitting the successes we are, simply due to people Volunteering .. ASANTE x!x

(Mary and my daughter, Robyn, at the fundraiser in May, this year)