Philadelphia Community Hospital salur is run by The Leprosy Mission since1950s. As the Leprosy is being reasonably controlled its numbers have fallen considerably. So the hospital is now treating general cases as well as Leprosy cases. The hospital also has out-reach programmes to reach out the needy and the sick people out in the community.
This particular out-reach programme (T.H.I.S) is mainly based in the Philadelphia Community Hospital (Leprosy Mission Hospital) using the nursing staff, eye technician and the doctors who are working in the hospital. The three villages (China Cheepuruvalsa, Peda Cheepuruvalsa, Panukuvalsa) the team goes out to do the clinics are within seven miles from the hospital.
These three villages comprises only the Mudhili Gadaba tribal population. These tribal population are very much ostracised with poor access to medical services. Hence they are very much in need of medical services for minor ailments and referral to Philadelphia Community Hospital for any major medical help. The team consists two nurses, eye technician, two drivers and a doctor. The team goes out to the villages and run the clinics twice a week in the villages and a doctor goes out with the team once in a month.
The job of the eye technician is to pick cataracts in the aged population and squints among the school children and give them appropriate treatment and refer them to the eye surgeon at Philadelphia community Hospital. Each one of them knows their jobs and they all fit in like the pieces in the puzzle and work as a team. They audit their work and the hospital pharmacist audit the medicines. So the team and their work are very much accountable to the hospital superintendant.
The money we both raise in UK through our church finance this out reach programme.
With myself in UK and the hospital superintendant are in constant touch with each other through emails. So we all know what we want and what we are doing and when we are doing. This service has been running for the last 5 years successfully by the will of God.
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From left to right:
Mr. D. Shyam Babu ( eye technician),
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Dr. Sunder Bethapudy and
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We work in the Leprosy Mission Philadelphia Community Hospital, Salur, Andhra Pradesh India, as the main base and reach out to Mudhili Gadaba tribal villages as an out reach programme about 7Kms from the hospital. Salur is located in Vizianagaram District, which is in north costal area of Andhra Pradesh. It is 55Kms away from Vizianagaram town which is a Distric Headquaters with inter state Railway Junction. The nearest Airport is in Vishakapatnam which is 110Kms.
We are a husband and wife team.
Our names are Dr. Sunder Rao Bethapudy and Dr.(Mrs) Kanakavalli Rao Bethapudy. We have been working in UK for more than 30 years and as community paediatricians for more than 20 years in Norwich, Norfolk UK.
We have two children, our son works as a General Practioner (doctor) near Norwich and daughter as a Dentist in London.
We wanted to serve our Lord Jesus Christ with our skills, after our retirement in 2008 we went to Philadelphia Leprosy Mission Hospital, Salur, India to do voluntary work.
There, we worked among MUDHILI GADABA tribal people and set up a community based clinics in their villages to meet the medical needs of these people maintaining links with the main Leprosy Mission Hospital at Salur. The Mudhili Gadaba people are very much ostracised due to their culture, language and have poor access to the main stream health services.
We provide free medication, pay for the nursing staff and transport to the villages for the whole year. We visit each year to maintain what is being done and find out resources needed for the coming year.
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