Integrated Holistic Healthcare at the Dayalbagh Medical Camp

A few weeks back, I had the opportunity to attend one of Dayalbagh Educational Institute's events TEDxDEI; an excellently organized event with so much of knowledge, learning and best practices being shared. One of the best talks at the event was by Dr. Anjoo Bhatnagar. She shared with us details of the excellent work being carried out by a pan-India team of Doctors and Super-Specialists, Doctors who follow the Hippocratic Oath and then do some more by including selfless service in their work.

Dr Anjoo Bhatnagar after completing her MBBS with honors and medals in almost all subjects of medicine and receiving President’s medal for her outstanding meritorious performance specialized in Pediatrics. After devoting half of her professional life in Leadership positions in Corporate Hospitals and in leading high-end intensive care pediatrics, she started participating in free medical camps at Dayalbagh and Rajaborari, starting from the inception of these camps around 8-9 years ago. While treating tribal and village children she realized that it’s here that her services are most needed. In her full-time role as a honorary consultant pediatrician and neonatologist at Saran Ashram Hospital at Dayalbagh she now uses her qualification and vast experience to treat children coming from disadvantaged backgrounds. Connecting to this needy segment of children has given her immense professional satisfaction. For her, this selfless service phase has been personally fulfilling and enriching and has been so very different from a world of gold medals, money and corporate hierarchies.

Dr. Anjoo Bhatnagar has put together a photo-essay this week explaining the genesis and working of this great initiative, sharing her experience of Dayalbagh multi-specialty medical and village assistance camps which have a mission to relieve the suffering of mankind by providing access to holistic Medical Healthcare Services to those who need it the most.

Remain Healthy,

Anurag

Dr. Anjoo writes...

Let me take you for a visit to a Dayalbagh multi-specialty medical camp.

It’s 7 AM on a Sunday morning, and with the sunrise, the sound of folk music has started resounding on the banks of river Yamuna, filling the entire village environment with new energy that has started catching everyone’s attention.

Children from nearby villages start running towards the camp site, with a broad  smile on their faces, eager to enjoy activities they love for the next 3 hours, ending their 14 day wait, an event that has happened again and again for last many years, and continues to give their lives a new momentum.

This little girl knows where to look for the child specialist for her fever and cold and has come straight to my desk with her sister. Children don’t even need their parents to accompany them for the doctor’s consultation as they feel so confident and familiar with us.

This girls parents believe in the Ayurvedic system for treatment and want "Desi Davai"  for her ailment, 

while this grandmother has brought her little one for nebulization as a quick fix for her wheezy chest for which she is otherwise undergoing homeopathic treatment.

She is a tall young girl, a frequent visitor to the camp and is happy to have tried her hands today on block printing and this is her creation.

While these girls are learning to make soft toys and 

she is so engrossed in thread work and will not like to be disturbed by anything else.

This young boy is now an expert in chess as he has been playing it for the last many years here at ‘hole in the wall’ computer counter and is now guiding other children to develop basic computer skills. This hole in the wall activity, is the most popular amongst the deprived village children who flock this counter in increasing number of more than 1,200 and in their over 8,000 visits in these years have become sharper than ever. They  frequently surprise us by their computer skills which they have developed on their own  while navigating  through and helping each other if they get stuck at any point.

This is a diverse scenario from our free multi-specialty camps which is organized under the aegis of Dayalbagh medical relief and social welfare charitable societies. 

These camps have become extremely popular not only around Dayalbagh but at several other places all over India including Rajaborari, the remote tribal area of Madhya Pradesh where it was conceived in the summer tour of 2010 by Revered Prof Prem Saran Satsangi Sahab.

In these multi-specialty camps the patients are treated in an integrated manner according to their needs and are given a tailor made prescription to suit their unique requirement, constitution and choice.

Keeping with government directives patients are given generic medicines and that too free of cost and not samples.

Doctors from different specialty and systems of medicine have been working in collaboration now for last so many years. They are so easily approachable to the patients and also to each other that they don’t even need to get out of their seat for this. The in- charge Dayalbagh Medical Relief Society helps in organizing the camp along with NSS scheme of Dayalbagh Educational Institute.

Besides giving health advantage through an integrated approach to the financially weaker sections of society, for the multifaceted development of their children, the camp provides Recreation facilities. Children are provided with the material to engage their attention and are encouraged to explore. They are given freedom to choose according to their interest and then are left to do things themselves. They form their own groups, change groups if they want. Kids teach themselves and learn what they want to learn.

All this has surprisingly transformed not only the life of these children but also of their families because there is something of interest for everyone, every age and every aptitude.

For housewives there is food preservation counter, for villagers there is Assistance Services at Chaupal for understanding their problems related with Agriculture, Dairying, Water, Power, Sanitation etc. and to help or offer most feasible solution to them.

And then there is the live interactive commentary on "Bhagvad Geeta Ke Updesh". This helps to give ethical and spiritual values among people of this Neighborhood Community, through discussion. By giving simple explanation of its verses which continues to resound in the background, and inculcates moral values while the camp is on. The concept is imbibed by  everyone  including subconscious mind of children, that  can sprout at time of need when life demands tough decisions to be taken while making  distinction between right and wrong, in a universal perspective.

Education & Career Counselling Services are offered to guide youth about education options/ centres  and employment opportunities and to counsel school dropouts. A counter for spoken English helps develop basic conversational skills is also in place.

One of the girls who started coming and playing here since the camp started, has evolved and with career guidance from the camp, gotten herself enrolled in college and is now completing her BA. She has helped 3 other girls from her village to get admission into Dayalbagh Educational Institute. Education and learning is happening through induction at the camp.

Initially when we started, children were hesitant to admit that they have started liking these activities and when I asked one of the boys that how do you like the camp he turned his face and looked away from me saying ‘buro kya hai’ meaning ‘not bad’. But now over the years our relationship has strengthened and the children have developed trust and interest and now when they are asked the same question they out rightly appreciate it and say ‘bahut badhia’, ‘bahut kuch seekha’, its excellent/ superb, we have learnt a lot here.

In the tribal area of Rajaborari in Madhya Pradesh, 9 years ago at the inception of the camp few basic medicines were distributed but gradually with inclusion of other systems of medicine like Homeopathy and  Ayurveda, the camp has evolved into a holistic health camp with additional facility of tele-medicine for taking expert advice in complicated cases for this unapproachable remote area so that proper referral follows. The villagers are happy to take advantage of it and many tribal women have also taken to soft toy manufacturing, food preservation and stitching as their profession learning these activities at the camp.

To summarize, the most important factor is that these Medical camps are based on an integrated holistic theme.

Second is the consistency of the team and regular follow up. It’s not like a single mobile camp which has been conducted for one day and the team never returns for follow up after the publicity has been achieved!

Third is that the cooperation and closeness amongst doctors of different specialties and systems of medicine without clash of ego and interest is very rare, where patient’s benefit is the only consideration and the team members are all highly motivated to provide voluntary selfless service to mankind.

Starting from its installation to its winding up everything is done on voluntary basis by a team of Dayalbagh Educational Institute students, teachers, staff, and doctors from Saran Ashram Hospital and even village children are happy to help. This has brought about a sea change in overall health of all its beneficiaries including the health of doctors; by adding this dimension to their personality i.e. with ‘selfless service’ they themselves are now enjoying holistic health!