A visit to the university of health science and technology

Sister Lissy Paul, CCV, from the India Province visited the Institute of Ayurveda and Integrative Medicine on May 20th and 21st, 2024. Here we share the story of this significant visit.

My connectedness with this University came in the year 2018, when I applied for Traditional Healers Certification for our Women Health Workers. For the last two decades, I had been training 30 Women Community Health Workers from 27 villages as traditional healers as they had some knowledge on medicinal plants handed over by the elders in their family. Out these 30 women, 10 of them were outstanding in practical knowledge and these women were registered in the University for certification in 2020. Due to COVID things were slow and in October 2023 a team of doctors came from the University to our Centre in Unai for Documentation and evaluation of their work as Traditional healers. In my discussion with the team, they found our women traditional healers worthy for certification. During the month of June, the final evaluation will take place in our Centre in Unai.

Another purpose of the visit to the university was to discuss the Sickle Cell Anemia Control program at Unai for the last 10 years. Our health care team in Unai, led by Sr. Lissy Paul CCV, had screened more than 10,000 people from three major tribes in Navsari and Tapi districts. The faculty from the university took great interest in our work, and a data analysis was done by them of our work. They promised to help us financially through the government to continue screening people for sickle cell anemia, as it is a hereditary disease found largely among the tribal group here.