My Nonprofit Reviews
mtoepke
Review for International Midwife Assistance, Inc., Boulder, CO, USA
I am a volunteer for IMA and also a health professional with expertise in midwifery and family planning. As a volunteer, I have had the opportunity to share the work of helping women give birth safely with the dynamic group of African professionals who staff Teso Safe Motherhood Project. Working inter-culturally like this has been valuable to me in learning to understand myself and my own culture. In turn I have taught, both at Teso Safe Motherhood Center and at Soroti Regional Referral Hospital, consulted on many issues including the development of the project's family planning program, and worked with contacts at the hospital to get information on the outcomes of our transports in order to compile useful statistics on our births. These are only three of the things that I have found challenging, engrossing, and useful to do. I am also slowly coming to understand more of the intricacies of the local culture. Fascinating. I love learning from a culture which is quite different (and yet in many respects very similar) to my own.
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Would you volunteer for this group again?
Definitely
For the time you spent, how much of an impact did you feel your work or activity had?
A lot
Did the organization use your time wisely?
Quite well
Would you recommend this group to a friend?
Definitely
When was your last experience with this nonprofit?
2012
Review for International Midwife Assistance, Inc., Boulder, CO, USA
International Midwife Assistance performs many valuable services, but I want to focus on the work I did in Afghanistan and some feedback I received later on. IMA worked with a midwifery training program in Bamiyan province, Afghanistan, where the infracture and medical services had been devastated by the first Taliban war. Bamiyan is one of the Hazara provinces, and the Taliban were particularly brutal there. This is the province where the giant Buddhas which were sculpted into grottoes in a cliff in ancient days were destroyed. I came in at the end of the midwifery training program to provide advanced IUD insertion workshops to midwives working in remote health centers. In the summer of 2009, the Afghan woman (she is a Hazara) who was our interpreter in Bamiyan had a chance to visit me in the United States. She had recently been to Bamiyan, and told me that the midwife nurses who were trained by IMA and their in-country partners were giving the best women's and children's health care the area had ever had. She especially praised the culturally appropriate nature of their care, as they are women from the same culture and ethnicity as the women they serve.
More Feedback
I've personally experienced the results of this organization in...
Personally, I have the opportunities to work in Afghanistan and Uganda, which has been very culturally enriching to me.
If I had to make changes to this organization, I would...
What I would like to do is make changes in the world, to stop the war in Afghanistan so IMA can get back in there and do the further work which has been requested of us. The highest death rates of mothers are in countries at war.
What I've enjoyed the most about my experience with this nonprofit is...
I experience personal growth when I get a chance to travel and to work in other cultures.
The kinds of staff and volunteers that I met were...
Many interesting people, hard working and dedicated, also different culturally from me.
If this organization had 10 million bucks, it could...
Do even more great work. The need for medical care in Africa care is extreme. However, it is often case that "money corrupts".
Ways to make it better...
I could afford a first class ticket so I could kick back a bit when travelling so far away. It's exhausting and literally a pain in the butt.
In my opinion, the biggest challenges facing this organization are...
Financial support, and getting people interested in other cultures.
One thing I'd also say is that...
Thanks to my friends in Afghanistan and Uganda who have made my work in those countries a joy.
How frequently have you been involved with the organization?
About once a year
When was your last experience with this nonprofit?
2010
