Purpose of health

Project Sothea’s Health Committee aims to constantly improve our health screening modalities and ensure the sustainability of Project Sothea’s efforts. The comm also collects and analyses health screening data to keep track of the effectiveness of our screenings. Key areas that Health Comm looks into are:

1. Health Screenings

2. Referrals

3. Doctors’ Visits

4. Health Partnerships

5. Doctors’ Recruitment

1. Health Screenings

Since 2010, medical professionals across various disciplines and organisations have joined the project on our annual trip to Battambang. Each year, the project conducts annual health screenings for villagers who present with acute or chronic conditions across all age groups. 

Purpose of Health Screenings

1. Provide immediate treatment of acute illnesses and problems

2. Set up a centralised electronic health database for longitudinal tracking of patients – utilising Biometrics System with Facial recognition (See Research and Development for more)

3. Characterise disease profiles and observe disease trends so as to customise interventions to target population 

4. Refer patients with chronic conditions to local hospitals in order to reconnect them with the local healthcare system

5. Refer emergency cases to local hospitals

Health Screening for villagers

The health screenings that we hold each year at our villages target both children and adults. This process includes:

• Basic health parameters

• Consultation and Treatment

• Pharmacy and General Health Survey

• PHQ2 for Mental Health Screening (IMH/NUH Psychiatry) 

• Evaluating the effectiveness of our screenings for future improvement

• Monitoring relevant trends in the village and hence better catering to their needs

• Referrals to hospitals for chronic and emergency case

Health Screening for Peaceful Children’s Home II

The project also conducts health screenings for the children at Peaceful Children’s Home 2, in which the health record system implemented since 2013 is used and updated. This will allow us to perform integral tasks such as to monitor the health of the children and to track their immunisation records. The screening will be similar to the above described, including:

• Basic health parameters

• Consultation and Treatment, Physical examination

• Pharmacy

• PHQ2 for Mental Health Screening (IMH/NUH Psychiatry) 

• Basic immunisation (if required)

• Referrals to hospitals for chronic and emergency cases

2. Referrals

Project Sothea’s referral system aims to enable patients to seek out appropriate medical care, which they often forego due to financial constraints or the physical distance necessary to access advanced medical care. For cases that cannot be managed with the drugs in our inventory, or upon doctor’s recommendation, villagers are referred to hospitals in Battambang city for further treatment. Some of the criteria for referrals are as follows:

• Emergency cases that would benefit from a higher level of medical care

• Chronic conditions that can be resolved with a one-time cost-effective treatment

• Acute conditions requiring further diagnosis that could significantly affect treatment

Every year, Project Sothea refers more than 30 villagers for a range of conditions ranging from cataracts, fractured bones, and suspected ischemic heart disease.

Our project is currently working with village leaders and partner NGOs to establish a referral system to check up on patients that have undergone treatment. This is part of our project’s wider aim to ensure sustainable long-term health outcomes for the villagers that we serve.

3. Doctors’ visit

Apart from our conventional health screening efforts in the villages, our door-to-door health screening initiative started in 2015 aims to bring health screening services to villagers who are either too ill to make their way to the main health screening site, or face mobility issues. Our target beneficiaries for this programme mainly comprise stroke patients, pregnant women, critically ill patients, and villagers with neuromuscular disorders or lower limb injuries. These door-to-door services increases the outreach of our health screening efforts, making health services more accessible to villagers who are more ill, while also serving as an educational opportunity for both Singaporean and Cambodian medical students to learn more about the various diseases in a rural setting.

During our 2020 Main Trip, we will use our Door-to-Door survey outreach programme as an opportunity to identify households that may not be able to travel down to the health screening site. Thereafter, we will send teams of doctors and medical students to visit these identified houses on two of our health screening days during the 2020 Main trip.

4. Health Partnerships

Partnerships with NGOs / other organisations

Since our move into two new villages in 2019, the project has formed strong partnerships with local Cambodian NGOs for our village health screening. The project partnered with HelpAge Cambodia in Srae Ou village and Caritas Cambodia in Roung 1 village. Our partner NGOs provide logistic support and augment the project’s referral and follow up system, which is a key component of the project’s sustainability plan. As the project only conducts screenings in our December Main Trips, our partner NGOs also follow up closely with our patients outside of our main trip. Apart from our health screening partners, the project is always actively looking out for other potential NGO partners to improve on other aspects of our screening. Other NGOs which the project is in close contact with includes Karuna, Khmer Sight Foundation, and SEVA Foundation, where we seek to improve on our current health screening modalities and bring in specific specialised screening modalities. Some of these include physiotherapy and advanced eye screening modalities to screen for eye conditions such as Glaucoma and Diabetic Retinopathy.

Partnerships with Clinics

The project maintains long term partnerships with private clinics in Battambang city, such as Handa Clinic, Yi Kuok Clinic and Sovann Clinic. Our partner clinics form an integral component of our referral and follow up system, and provide generous discounts to our villagers when they seek treatment.

5. Doctors’ Recruitment

We begin our doctors’ recruitment around mid June for our December Main Trip. Project Sothea reaches out to doctors who are (non exhaustive): alumni of our project, from Singapore Medical Association, department heads or through personal contacts. Our selection includes doctors who are experienced and specialised in certain areas such as pediatrics or geriatrics to further improve our focus during health screenings. Some of our doctors have been following us for many years and we are extremely grateful for their continued support.