Another life saved in Timor Leste
Dili - Marciana is 38 and has eight children. She’d just miscarried her ninth child when she heard that the MSI Timor Leste outreach team was coming to a village (Atsabe) near her home in a few days time. Atsabe is a remote mountain village about six hours drive from the capital Dili and the nearest hospital. The MSI team have recently begun working in the area with the support of SUCO (the Ministry of Health).
Marciana had never had access to family planning before but worried about getting pregnant again so soon, so she wanted to find out more about family planning. She also brought four of her children along to the session so they could also have a health check at the same time. Having listened to Fernanda, the MSI Timor Leste midwife, explain about family planning and the options available, Marciana decided to have an IUD inserted.
However, when Fernanda examined Marciana she immediately realised that the miscarriage wasn’t complete. The foetus was stuck in Marciana’s cervix and she was bleeding heavily, although Marciana hadn’t realised this because all the blood was blocked from escaping by the stuck foetus. Another few hours or so and an infection would have set in and Marciana would have died.
Fernanda immediately gave Marciana an injection to help stop the bleeding and delivered the foetus. With the foetus removed, the blood that had been building up was able to freely and safely flow from Marciana's body. There was a lot of it and it took some time to staunch the flow and clean Marciana up. Once she was clean and comfortable, Fernanda safely inserted the IUD and gave Marciana antibiotics to take home with her. The MSI team then took Marciana home; otherwise she would have had to walk several miles.
Every day, MSI is making a difference to the lives of women, men and children in Timor Leste and if Fernanda and MSI Timor Leste team had not been in Atsabe that day, Marciana would have died leaving a husband with eight children to care for.