Volunteer midwife, Donna Hall, has written a story about her six weeks volunteering with us in October 2024 in Malawi. Read her full story.
Volunteering in Africa was a lifelong ambition following completion of my training to be a midwife way back in 1997. Why Africa? Well this was where my great grandfather had originated from and therefore was a place of interest to me. Why now? With my family grown up, now was a good a time as ever to fulfil this lifelong ambition. Thankfully my work were in support of this (some did think me mad) and allowed me to have 6 weeks away from my place of work in an NHS hospital.
I had never travelled or done anything like this before but even though I was alone I never felt it. The team at Ripple Africa made everything so easy and after a couple of weeks I was soon embedded into Malawi life. I spent my time at Chintheche Hospital and Kande Health Centre. As a labour ward midwife, I felt this was where I could be the most useful, and be the environment where I would be most comfortable.
Birth in Malawi is a very different experience to the UK and I soon got use to not having the equipment and drugs that would often have made a difference to outcomes. Acceptance is very much part of the culture as a lot of things are out of their control and in order to continually be exposed to that day in day out you have to find a way to cope.
During my placement at Kande Health Centre I had the opportunity to meet the overseas team who were providing the funding to build a new maternity ward there. I was able to get involved and help compile the list of essential equipment that would be needed when this opened hopefully at the beginning of next year.
I met some of the most extraordinary people and learnt so much about myself, not just from a midwifery perspective but about me and what is truly important – and I thought I had a good insight on that already!
Volunteering is definitely something I would recommend to everyone and I would love to do again provided I had the finances and time. Towards the end of my six week placement I didn’t want to leave and I did shed some tears (I’m not going to lie). I will forever be grateful of the opportunity that Ripple Africa gave me.
If you want to find out more about volunteering with Ripple Africa, click here.