Health promotion is a partial solution to improving sickle cell healthcare

Today 19^th June Uganda joins the rest of the world to commemorate World Sickle Cell Day and the national function will be at the Ministry of Health Headquarters in Kampala. We are marking 10 years ever since the United Nations declared June 19^th as World Sickle Cell Day in order to raise awareness of the disease in the world. The theme for this year is “Break the silence, lets care”.  It’s a good call for everybody to come out and stop the silence about this silent killer that is claiming many lives every day in Uganda and around the world. The Ministry of Health and all stakeholders in the sickle cell fraternity are calling everyone to stop the sickle cell related stigma and discrimination in the society and mistreatment in health facilities of people living with sickle cell disease.

To achieve this, we need sickle cell health promotions campaigns that target all audiences. Health promotion is the backbone to all the programs of improving the quality of healthcare of people living with sickle cell disease and realize a sickle cell free generation in future. World Health Organisation (WHO) argues that health promotion enables people to increase control over and to improve their health.

Our medical culture has always emphasized pharmacosurgical interventions that produce immediate results whose dosage can easily be defined and controlled. Over the past few decades, there is an increasing recognition that biomedical intervention alone cannot guarantee health.

The medical culture of prioritizing pharmacosurgical interventions has deprived people an opportunity to live a life which is not managed by drugs all the time. The effect has been increased household spending on healthcare leaving little for investment. Most of the diseases treated in healthcare facilities can be prevented if health promotion campaigns are taken as a priority to make the population aware of the best preventive measures.

As we commemorate World Sickle Cell day we need to reflect on the strategies that can be put in place to reduce on the 20,000 babies born with sickle cell disease every year in Uganda. We also need to see that those born can be able to survive and live productively into their adulthood.

Our experience and interventions as Action Against  Sickle Cell Disease has proved that health promotion is more relevant today than it was yesterday in addressing the issue of healthcare for people with sickle cell disease. One strategy we have employed has been homecare management of sickle cell where parents, caregivers and patients have been trained on how to better manage at home. The strategy has been having much input from the population through sharing their experience with others as well as taking into consideration the cultural beliefs and income status of the people.

In February 2018 Action Against Sickle Cell Disease working with our partners we conducted homecare sickle cell management for our clients at Ngora Health Centre IV sickle cell clinic to prepare them for the rain season. Most of the people became aware of factors that could trigger crises and how to prevent and detect crises early. In the last 6 weeks we have only receive one person who came in need of IV, out of more than 700 registered patients. The results have been good and worth replicating in other health areas.

Sickle cell is a public health concern that’s needs multiple interventions to promote healthy living. We need collaborative initiative with the community to understand the cultural beliefs and behaviors and educating them about sickle cell to produce desirable results. This approach will empower individuals and communities to take actions for their own health, foster leadership for better health, promote inter-sectorial action to build health public policies and create sustainable health systems in the society. We need to have sickle cell awareness as core of any sickle cell intervention program. To undergo any behavior change, the person first needs to become aware of what he or she is going to change.

The advancement and penetration of technology should be a tool to harness health promotion campaigns. Technology is a double edged sword which can be used to promote right information or distort the facts.

The highest possible standards of healthcare for people living with sickle cell disease depends on a comprehensive, holistic approach which goes beyond the traditional curative care involving communities, healthcare providers and other stakeholders.