News Releases
News Releases for 2013
We are very excited to announce that OHW will be Dining for Women's featured project for July 2013!
[05.01.13]
Dining for Women is a dinner giving circle. Chapter members “dine in” together as a chapter once a month, each bringing a dish to share, and then pooling “dining out” dollars (what would have been spent if they had eaten at a restaurant) to send to programs empowering women worldwide. All of the donations from hundreds of chapters are then combined to support carefully selected international programs each month. Dining for Women funds grass-roots programs in education, healthcare, vocational training, micro-credit loans and economic development. The programs they support are aimed to improve the living situations for women and their families, by providing the tools they need to make changes.
One Heart World-Wide is very excited to announce that we have been chosen to be the lucky recipient of July 2013’s “dining out” dollars! This funding will be used to expand the Network of Safety in Western Nepal by funding four master trainers’ salaries and benefits for one year, training expenses and supplies for 800 trainees, and 2,000 birthing kits which include gloves, plastic sheeting, razor blade, string, soap. Our goal is to empower Female Community Health Volunteers as efficient maternal and neonatal health outreach providers for both Baglung and Dolpa districts. By strengthening the maternal and neonatal knowledge and skills of local FCHV who care for women and their newborns at the village level, we will in turn increase the access to skilled birth attendants, essential resources, and safe motherhood messages for vulnerable pregnant women, leading to better birth outcomes across our program areas.
We could not be more grateful for this opportunity. The support of Dining for Women will allow us to save many lives, one birth at a time.
Stay tuned for updates!
To learn more about Dining for Women and the project they are funding, visit www.diningforwomen.org
New Blog Post from the Maternal Health Task Force's Blog Series on Respectful Maternal Care
[05.01.13]
Cultural sensitivity training for maternal health providers
POSTED ON APRIL 23, 2013 BY SARAH BLAKE
Guest post by Arlene Samen APRN, Founder and CEO, One Heart World-Wide
The integration of modern medicine into traditional systems can be challenging. One Heart World-Wide (OHW) works with the Tarahumara populations of the Canyon in Northern Mexico. The Tarahumara are among the indigenous groups farthest removed from mainstream society, and as a result suffer from many barriers to care. Discrimination against indigenous groups in Mexico creates one such barrier. Many Tarahumara people fear that medical providers will disrespect them, violate their right to make informed medical/family planning choices, or otherwise mistreat them. Language barriers further exacerbate these issues, as many Tarahumara do not speak Spanish and many providers do not take the time to make sure indigenous patients have understood them.
Many Tarahumara women feel that providers make little effort to understand their practices or beliefs, and often act with an air of superiority by telling women that there is no place for their use of traditional parteras (midwives). They often leave the clinics feeling patronized and without an understanding of the care or advice they have received. This is due to the complicated medical language that the providers use, which even a well-educated, native Spanish speaker might have trouble with.
These circumstances, coupled with the difficult travel and long distances that many women face in order to reach a clinic, lead to almost 90% of Tarahumara women delivering without a skilled birth attendant. This in turn results in dismal maternal and neonatal survival outcomes.
OHW is seeking to improve this situation through our Network of Safety model. The Network of Safety is an intervention aimed simultaneously at several levels, from the mothers to the referral hospital. Providers are trained, health facilities are upgraded and outreach programs on safe motherhood target community members.
In order to encourage facility-based deliveries, we have found it necessary not only to inform women of services available and advise them on their use, but also to work with clinical staff to ensure they provide culturally appropriate, quality care to indigenous patients. We want the Tarahumara women to feel comfortable in the clinics so that they will be willing to return.
We recently began including a new cultural sensitivity training module in all of our trainings for providers. Our trainers focus on raising awareness on the effects of communication on patient relations by discussing intercultural communication theories and dynamics and by practicing techniques to increase clarity and understanding by both parties. Through the exploration of different viewpoints, we invite trainees to recognize beliefs held by the Tarahumara, even if they are not aligned with their own, so long as they do not cause harm to the mother or newborn.
It is our hope that behavioral changes among health care providers that lead to more respectful provision of care will allow for greater changes among the Tarahumara as well, ultimately resulting in increased numbers of facility-based/attended births and therefore healthier birth outcomes for Tarahumara women.
For more in the respectful maternity care blog series, click here.
For more on Maternal Health Task Force, visit their website
Women Deliver: Celebrate Solutions
[04.04.13]
(from Women Deliver‘s blog series, Celebrate Solutions. To view full post, click here.)
NEWS
Celebrate Solutions: “Foot Soldiers of Change” Bring Healthcare to Rural Women
January 14th, 2013
By: Joanna Hoffman, Women Deliver
Throughout the world, rural women are particularly disadvantaged in their access to quality maternal health care. Distance to health facilities, lack of trained health workers, and supply shortages are some of the most prominent barriers preventing women from reaching the care they need to be healthy. In the Copper Canyon, it can take residents four hours by foot to reach the nearest clinic and another six or eight by truck to reach a hospital. The situation is not much better in much of Nepal, where seven out of ten babies are born at home without a skilled health worker, and a young mother dies every four hours.
One Heart World-Wide began operations in Nepal and Mexico operating under the motto, “To work in places where no one else dares to, but where the need is the greatest.” On a local level, volunteers are trained as “Foot Soldiers of Change” who hike through remote areas, bringing safe motherhood tips, clean birth kits and prenatal vitamins to pregnant women in their communities. They are also trained to recognize signs of dangerous complications, and how to safely evacuate women in life-threatening situations. For many, these Foot Soldiers serve as the much-needed link between rural pregnant women and essential health care.
As of March 2012, One Heart World-Wide had trained 70 volunteers in Mexico and another 500 in Western Nepal. For the 2,000 pregnant women they have helped, these volunteers truly are “Foot Soldiers of Change”, bringing hope to those in the most remote corners of the planet. As distant as they may feel from the rest of the world, these women now have someone looking out for them, crossing canyons and mountains through the day and night to ensure a world with fewer tragic statistics and more healthy mothers.
To support One Heart World-wide, check out their projects on Catapult here.
Flickr photo via Gates Foundation.
Catch up on One Heart's work during 2012
[03.26.13]
Curious about what we have been up to lately? Take a look at our 2012 Newsletter and Annual Report to find out more!
News Releases for 2012
ARLENE SAMEN WINS GOLD STEVIE® AWARD IN 2012 STEVIE AWARDS FOR WOMEN IN BUSINESS
[11.13.12]
Winners Announced at Event in New York City
SAN FRANCISCO, CA – November 13, 2012 – One Heart World-Wide has been named the winner of a gold Stevie® Award in the Women Helping Women category in the 9th annual Stevie Awards for Women in Business.
The Stevie Awards for Women in Business are the world’s top honors for female entrepreneurs, executives, and the organizations they run. All individuals and organizations worldwide are eligible to submit nominations – public and private, for-profit and non-profit, large and small. The 2012 awards received entries from 17 nations and territories.
Nicknamed the Stevies for the Greek word for “crowned,” the awards were presented to winners during a dinner at the Marriott Marquis Hotel in New York City.
More than 1,200 nominations from organizations of all sizes and in virtually every industry were submitted this year for consideration in a wide range of categories, including Entrepreneur of the Year, Executive of the Year, Company of the Year, Mentor of the Year, Women Helping Women, and Communications Campaign of the Year, among others. One Heart World-Wide won in the Women Helping Women category for Government or Non-profit.
Arlene Samen has been a Nurse Practitioner in Maternal Fetal Medicine for 31 years. In 2004, she left her University of Utah clinical practice to dedicate her life to serving pregnant women living in the most vulnerable conditions. She founded One Heart World-Wide to be the “Network of Safety” for women in Tibet, Nepal and Mexico in order to reduce the high rates of preventable maternal and neonatal deaths in these remote areas.
Arlene was selected as one of the 50 Unsung Heroes for Acts of Compassion in 2001 and a CNN “Hero” of the week in 2008. She has been a recipient of the Soroptomist Women Making a Difference Award. In 2009, she was a Rainer Arnhold Fellow with the Mulago Foundation and is a current member of the Clinton Global Initiative. In 2011, she was a TEDxSF guest speaker.
Sibylle Kristensen, One Heart World-Wide COO says, “Arlene Samen is one of the most compassionate people I have ever had the honor to meet. She relentlessly fights to ensure that all mothers and newborns survive pregnancy and delivery. Her dedication never waivers, despite all of the many obstacles she faces. Arlene is a force to reckon with.”
We were honored to have One Heart World-Wide Board President, Jay Blumenkopf, attend the award ceremony and to accept on behalf of Arlene and the organization.
Stevie Award winners were selected by more than 200 executives worldwide who participated in the judging process this year.
“I’m very pleased that we were able to conclude our tenth year of organizing Stevie Awards programs with a very successful Women in Business event,” said Michael Gallagher, president and founder of the Stevie Awards. “This year’s Stevie Award-winning women are the most accomplished, impressive group we’ve ever had. Their stories of success will be an inspiration to women around the globe who dream of starting and growing a business and making a difference in the world.”
Details about the Stevie Awards for Women in Business and the list of Stevie Award winners are available at www.StevieAwards.com/Women.
About One Heart World-Wide
Based on over ten years of experience in Tibet, One Heart World-Wide established an effective, replicable and sustainable model to reduce preventable deaths related to pregnancy and childbirth among remote rural indigenous populations. This model improves the health and wellbeing of pregnant women and infants that may not otherwise have access to medical or public health services due to socio-cultural barriers, limited personal resources or remote living conditions. The organization is based in San Francisco and can be reached at 415-379-4762. Find out more at www.oneheartworld-wide.org
About the Stevie Awards
Stevie Awards are conferred in four programs: The International Business Awards, The American Business Awards, the Stevie Awards for Women in Business, and the Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service. Honoring organizations of all types and sizes and the people behind them, the Stevies recognize outstanding performances in the workplace worldwide. Learn more about The Stevie Awards at www.StevieAwards.com.
Contact:
Jenny Holl or Arlene Samen
(415) 379-4762
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OHW's work is highlighted by photographer, Raechel Running in new post on The Lamp Project
[10.24.12]
“...Raechel uses her work to advance many non-profit organizations that serve social and environmental needs. Among them is the Mexico Program of One Heart World-Wide, which trains community members and outreach workers to provide obstetrical and neonatal care to indigenous women in Mexico’s Copper Canyon region. These women, called Tarahumara (or Raramuri in their own language), represent only 3% of the Mexico’s population but account for 38% of all maternal deaths. Most live in small settlements at least three hours away from the nearest health post and a least a day away from the nearest facility equipped to handle deliveries.
One Heart President and Founder, Arlene Samen, says, ‚“Raechel has done so much to highlight the plight of the Tarahumara women in the Copper Canyon, who die needlessly at home due to lack of access to care. Through her photography, Raechel has brought much-needed attention to the cause.”
As Raechel puts it herself: “What I have learned from my time in Mexico is, it’s not about being afraid but about the spirit of resiliency and courage to dream against the odds.”
Raechel Running’s works can be seen online at raechelrunning.com and issuu.com/rmrunning, as well as on websites of some of the organizations she supports.”
Running a Hunger Race: One Heart Mexico Relieves Food Shortages in the Copper Canyon of Mexico
[07.19.12]
Arlene Samen, Nurse practitioner in maternal fetal medicine
Posted 07/14/2012 5:01 pm
The Tarahumaras have been known for their superhuman physical stamina and strength in long-distance running. The celebrated National best-seller novel, Born to Run, has attracted the attention of many to this indigenous population hidden within the Copper Canyon of Mexico.
This time, however, the race is not as favorable.
Since the beginning of 2012, the worst drought that Mexico has endured in the past 70 years has devastated many lives of the Tarahumara population living in the state of Chihuahua. Crops desiccated before the harvest season; livestock perished in the semi-arid pastures; people struggled to keep their families alive. Numerous organizations, including One Heart World-Wide, joined hands to support a relief program for the community isolated by its geographic barriers.
One Heart World-Wide is a nonprofit organization that strives to reduce maternal and infant mortality in remote communities, and the Tarahumaras have been one of the communities we work with since 2009. In instances of food shortages, pregnant woman and infants are the most susceptible to the risk of malnutrition and starvation. Proper nutrition during pregnancy and infancy are necessary for healthy development, and a lack of basic nutrients contributes to increased rates of illness and even death.
The two-year drought has brought tremendous stress to the people. In order to alleviate this issue, One Heart World-Wide has successfully raised funds from the Dorothea Haus Ross Foundation and other generous donors to purchase food packages that constitute a typical Tarahumara diet of corn, rice, beans, milk, cooking oil, noodle soup, sugar, corn dough, salt and coffee. Each food package is sufficient to nourish a family for a month. We found a local vendor and distributor, Diconsa S.A. that delivers the food packages in a timely and efficient manner.
Diconsa S.A. delivered the food to two central locations, one at the municipal clinic of Urique and the other on the opposite end of the canyon, in a village called Cerocahui. The perilous transport of the food packages from these central locations to the more remote communities would not have been possible if it were not for One Heart-Mexico volunteers and members of the Health Service Authorities. They assembled and distributed these food packages to families with either a pregnant woman or a nursing mother.
Unfortunately, the devastation brought by the drought and the food shortages have led the Tarahumaras to seek other resources for income. Some, out of desperation, resort to becoming “burros” (illegally transporting marijuana on foot in very dangerous situations) between the US and Mexican borders. Camillo Villegas-Cruz, a Tarahumara, explained his conflicting situation in a Newsweek report issued in June 2012. When strangers offered them him to be a burro for $1500, he quickly accepted and found himself in jail when the US border patrol caught him.
No one knows when the hunger race will end. Regardless, as public crowds cheer and encourage marathon runners during a race, so should we support the Tarahumaras in whatever way possible.
With determination and hope, there is no doubt that the Tarahumaras will finish this race strongly.
Read the full press release here »
Saving the Lives of Mothers and Newborns in Remote Areas of Nepal
[07.19.12]
Arlene Samen, Nurse practitioner in maternal fetal medicine
Posted 4/20/2012 5:23 pm
One Heart World-Wide, a 501c3 nonprofit organization dedicated to the prevention of maternal and neonatal deaths, has been setting up birthing centers in Nepal.
Our most recent project established a birthing center in Dolpa district, one of the five districts of the Karnali Zone in Western Nepal. Dolpa is an extremely remote and rural area bordering Tibet. The nearest road is ten days walking distance and there are no regular flight connections. It is one of the least developed areas in the world, where people lack access to basic health services, infrastructure, education and electricity, mostly due to the difficult terrain, with elevations up to 25,000 feet.
There are no functional birthing centers in Dolpa. Most health posts consist of an empty room, while some of them have rudimentary equipment it is often in dismal condition. The existing staff is often not adequately trained.
To set up a birthing center in such conditions requires many hours of hard manual labor, as all necessary materials (including cement, paint, plumbing supplies, hospital beds, solar panels and medical equipment) have to be carried over the mountains on foot.
As part of our work, existing health posts are renovated, painted and equipped to function as birthing centers. The local staff is trained as skilled birth attendants and the One Heart team spends some time at the newly opened birthing center to provide support to the newly trained staff in their new environment.
Having heard of the new birthing center, one pregnant woman arrived from Saldang in Upper Dolpa. After camping for more than one week outside of the new birthing center, her water broke. As she was examined, it was discovered that she had a heart condition, putting her at a much higher risk for problems during her delivery. Despite this, she had managed an 8- day hike over two passes above 17,400 feet, all while being 8 ½ months pregnant. Apart from her heart condition, the mother was also at risk of postpartum hemorrhage as this was her sixth pregnancy. Her labor was fairly quick and the midwife assisted her in delivering a healthy baby boy. The mother and father were so excited. The mother had only minimal blood loss and no complications.
Our mother from Saldang was still lying in her delivery bed when a group of men arrived with a nineteen-year-old woman on a stretcher. The young woman was pregnant with her first baby and had been bleeding for several hours. While the delivery room was being cleaned, the midwife knelt on the concrete floor in the corridor and began to examine her. The young mother was pale, she had fever, her heartbeat was irregular, and her abdomen was tense and tender. She was seven months pregnant and had regular contractions (every five minutes). The fetal heartbeat (heard through the very recently donated Doppler) was very weak. The team feared that the baby would not survive the labor contractions.
Thankfully, by the time the team was done with her exam, the delivery room was ready for our new mother. The laboring mother was quickly transferred to the delivery bed and the team soon welcomed a 4.63 pounds low-birth-weight baby boy that appeared to be premature. The baby required assistance with a bag and mask to start breathing. Once stable, the baby was placed skin-to-skin on the mother’s chest in Kangaroo Care position. There baby nuzzled around her breasts but failed to properly attached and suck; another sign of prematurity. There was great concern that the baby would not survive if it couldn’t suck. The fact that there are no neonatal intensive care units in the remote mountains of the Himalayas, combined with the low temperatures in the region that can be particularly dangerous to newborns, had the team very worried, but they were also determined to give the baby a chance to live. As the newborn was too weak initially to latch and suck from mother’s breasts, the mother was taught manual expression of breast milk which could then be caught in a syringe and fed to the baby drop by drop. The baby was kept in close contact with the mother using the Kangaroo Care method and given antibiotics as prevention against infection. Over the next few days, the baby gained strength and slowly started breastfeed on his own. Six days after his birth, he was able to leave the birthing center with his mother.
To date, One Heart World-Wide has equipped five birthing centers in Western Nepal, four in Baglung District and the most recent one in Dolpa. For more information on our work in Nepal, please check out our website at: http://www.oneheartworld-wide.org , email us at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) , or give us a call at 415-379-4762.
Read the full press release here »
One Heart World-Wide's "Foot Soldiers of Change": A Story of Hope From the Bottom of the Copper Canyon
[03.29.12]
(view full article here)
Arlene Samen, Nurse practitioner in maternal fetal medicine
Posted: 03/22/2012 5:02 pm
Victoria Castro may only be 15 years-old, but this has not stopped her from already having saved several lives. Victoria is a Tarahumara (also called Raramuri) Indian living in the Copper Canyon of the Sierra Madre of Mexico, a canyon both deeper and larger of the Grand Canyon. It is an extremely remote and rural area with very little road access.
From Victoria’s house, it is a four-hour walk to get to the nearest clinic and another six to eight hours by truck to reach the nearest hospital, depending on the state of the road. Many people in her community live in nearby caves, others in rudimentary houses without electricity or running water. Most women deliver at home alone, without the help of a skilled birth attendant, and predictably, many women and newborns die in the process.
Globally, more than 360,000 mothers and 3.6 million newborns die each year. Most of these deaths happen in remote areas of the world where women give birth at home, alone, or without a skilled birth attendant. Mothers and newborns are at their most vulnerable during childbirth and in the early postnatal period.
To address this issue, One Heart World-Wide has developed the “Network of Safety,” a model adapted for the most remote rural areas of the world. Simply put, we work with the local communities and local health providers to raise awareness, teach good practices, and distribute essential supplies.
Our operations are currently based in remote areas of the Karnali Zone in Western Nepal and in the Copper Canyon of the Sierra Madre in Mexico. Our motto is “To work in places where no one else dares to, but where the need is the greatest.” We specialize in areas with the greatest need, lowest human development index, and where other organizations do not operate due to logistic or environmental difficulties.
At the community level, our model trains and empowers local men and women to help local pregnant women access care and facilitate the evacuation of obstetric emergencies. These volunteers, along with our team members, are our “Foot Soldiers of Change,” who relentlessly hike mountains and canyons to help pregnant women and newborns in need. These Foot Soldiers are also recognized advocates for community women and infants within the health system, facilitating much needed communications between rural communities and the established health system.
Because she wanted to make a difference for the women and infants of her remote community, Victoria decided to become one of our Foot Soldiers.
One Heart World-Wide trained and equipped Victoria. She is now providing safe motherhood messages, clean birth kits and prenatal vitamins to the pregnant women of her community. Victoria has been trained to assist a normal delivery, in case the mother does not make it to the clinic in time. She is also able recognize the danger signs of complications during pregnancy and delivery, and she knows when (and how) to evacuate a woman in danger.
Victoria is the only trained health worker in her remote community. Since the completion of her training, she has attended three births where the women did not make it on time to the clinic. For one of them, Victoria told us, “We had to walk four hours to reach her only to find it was too late and she had to deliver at home. Her delivery was successful without any complications,” she said to us proudly. As with all home deliveries that she has attended, Victoria used the clean birth kit that was provided by One Heart World-Wide to ensure that the unsanitary conditions in which the mother lived did not affect the birthing process. Victoria also successfully evacuated a complication to the referral hospital and she has convinced the six other pregnant women in her community to go to the clinic for prenatal care and delivery. In each case, Victoria comes along. She wears her One Heart World-Wide badge well in evidence and has successfully served as intermediary between the pregnant women and the health system.
To date, One Heart World-Wide has trained 70 volunteers in Mexico and another 500 in Western Nepal. We are truly grateful to Victoria and to all our other Foot Soldiers of Change, both in Mexico and Nepal. Thanks to their efforts, local women and infants who, because of socio-cultural barriers, limited personal resources, or remote living conditions may not have been able to access care are now able to survive pregnancy and delivery.
For more information about how you can help please check out our website at: http://www.oneheartworld-wide.org, email us at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address), or give us a call at 415- 379-4762.
Read the full press release here »
Happy International Women's Day!
[03.08.12]
Today, in celebration of International Women’s Day, Arlene Samen, President & Founder of One Heart World-Wide will be a panelist at the WIE Symposium in London. She will be joining the White Ribbon Alliance for Safe Motherhood and many influential women in discussing “Dreams for My Daughter.” Watch this video to learn more about the theme.
