Final Partnership Project Experience

I have had an incredible experience working with Dr. Nana Esi Gaisie and my group for our final partnership project. Dr. Nana approached our group with the goal to empower parents and families with knowledge for early detection of developmental problems in Ghana. She has seen that many parents are unable to identify the special needs of their children at different milestones. On top of this, many parents have difficulty accepting special needs diagnosis due to the stigma. When parents come for care, it is often too late.

Dr. Nana is a pediatrics staff physician at the Effia Nkwanta Regional Hospital in Ghana. She has learned that optimal care of children with special needs starts with the parents. Through weekly meetings with Dr. Nana, my group has produced a screening tool that we believe will be extremely useful for new parents to learn more about developmental milestones. Our discussions have centered around ensuring that this tool is culturally appropriate and will be accessible to the community. Dr. Nana has selected milestones that she believes best fit the Ghanaian culture and our group member, Sara, will be illustrating images for those parents who are illiterate.

I am extremely appreciative of Dr. Nana’s flexibility in making time to meet with our group. She has shared so much of her knowledge on child development and has taught us a great amount about Ghanaian culture. We are very excited to present our deliverable in the upcoming weeks as well as to have the screening tool dispersed to prenatal mothers at Dr. Nana’s hospital. Each group member has put in a great deal of effort and I look forward to sharing our semester’s work.