What does hand washing have to do with Audiology?

It was an exciting day at Candy Floss, as we arrived with a black bin, finger paint and props for our skit. We had decided to do a workshop on hygiene at the preschool as we felt that this was an area that a lot of the children did not know about, or practice.

Our main motivation for conducting the workshop was from the hearing screening results. We have found that many of the children fail tympanometry as a result of fluid in the middle ear cavity, and most of the children came in for testing with a running nose or a cough. Through hand washing the spread of germs is prevented, which means that children will be less likely to get a cold or the flu, and therefore less likely to get ear infections. We also noticed that there are no handles on the taps in the bathroom, so hand washing is not a consistent activity.

Many organisations have conducted research on the impact that hand washing can make. UNICEF found that hand washing with soap can prevent respiratory infections (which often result in fluid in the middle ear) by a quarter. The Centre for Disease Control and Prevention found that hand washing not only prevents sickness and diseases that can lead to death, but their research has shown that children who were given intensive hand washing promotion for 9 months, later reached developmental milestones 6 months earlier than the children who did not receive the hand washing promotion. You can read more about it here.

I recently came across a Youtube video of a project called Hope Soap that has started in South Africa. It is worth the watch, I LOVE the idea and it is sure to put a smile on your face :)

We started the day by dividing the children into their 3 different age groups so that we would have smaller groups to control, and started with a skit. The message of the skit was that we should wash our hands before eating, after using the toilet, playing outside, sneezing or coughing, picking up rubbish or petting animals. It was done in a fun, light hearted way, and we got the children involved by singing songs about hand washing with corresponding actions. Next our speechie friends did a hand washing demonstration on the correct way to wash hands and invited some of the children up to demonstrate what they had learned to their class.

We continued the workshop by giving some tips on ear care, such as not using Q-tips/ear buds. Even the teachers were surprised to hear that they should not be used to clean ears! Next we went on a litter hunt with the children and encouraged them to keep their environment clean and tidy. If you haven't read my post where I talk about the litter in the area and the preschool, here are some photos for you...

Litter in the play area after break time

Litter in the community

Once our hands were nice and dirty from picking up litter, we got all of the children around to wash our hands and practice what had been taught. It was slightly chaotic as they were all pushing to get to the front of the line, but at least they were enthusiastic about it! We had also bought a black bin that we were going to get the children to finger paint, however we ran out of time! The children are definitely looking forward painting it this coming Thursday.

I really hope that this small workshop will have made a BIG impact on the children at this school!

Term 2!

Its been one of those weeks when I have worked with a lot of children! In fact, I didn't see any adult patients at all! Working with children is messy! This week resulted in my Saturday being spent disinfecting all of the toys I use for assessment and therapy...everything-from blindfolds for games at the creche to blocks to teddy bears-has either been drooled on, put in a kids mouth or used as a tissue...But every time I am able to complete a hearing screening or assessment, or achieve my aims in a therapy session, I am reminded that it is WORTH it!

A new group of speech therapy and occupational therapy students have joined us, as the last group has moved on to a new prac. While I am starting to feel quite settled in to the creche and community, it is a whole new experience for the speechies and OT's who have just started. This week we spend a lot of time explaining and discussing what we have found to work in therapy in the creche, including taking note of the children who need a bit of extra attention during activities. I am learning how to share information that we have discovered over the past 6 weeks, while still leaving room for creativity, new ideas and different perspectives from the new students. I would hate to get stuck into the rut of doing the same games and activities every single week, instead of having our creativity challenged to make our 3 hours at the creche the best 3 hours of those children's week!

This week was significant because OT and Speech and Language assessments have been completed in Rainbow creche! Individual therapy programs are starting to unfold for those who show significant delay- as opposed to group therapy where we target very general aims. Group therapy still goes on for the rest of the Grade R's (5 year olds), where we have been focusing on development of auditory skills, fine and gross motor skills and language development. I still have to learn a lot about the cultures and socio-economic backgrounds of these children in order to ensure that the instructions and stimuli used in our activities are relevant. I feel as if we were not really on top of our game this week with some of the stimuli, and this showed as the children lost focus easily.

We should be completing the hearing screening at the creche in the next session. So far we have identified many children with impacted cerumen, and have nearly finished developing an information letter to be sent home to the parents...the reality is that the parents wont be able to take their children to the hospital for cerumen management, so we are trying to suggest alternatives, such as using olive oil or cerumen softening drops. To be honest, I don't even know how many of the parents will spend money on olive oil or softening drops... so if anyone reading this blog has any other suggestions for cerumen management in this community, share the ideas! I get frustrated that so many children in communities in South Africa don't get the help and intervention that they need!

It seems as though this prac might be changed up a bit, as new locations within the community are added...I am excited to get involved in other parts of the Mariannridge community!