Dear Editor, 

 On Sunday, July 19 at 4 p.m. at Nederland Community Presbyterian Church, the public is invited to a classical guitar concert by the Boulder Alegria Guitar Group. The group includes musicians Eri McAuley, Nancy Rao, Carol Ann Kearns, Steve Richardson, Robert McAuley, and Richard Ryan. Many of the classical guitar pieces they will perform were arranged by the ensemble’s musical director Masakazu Ito, recognized as one of today’s premiere guitarists.

The church is located at 210 N. Jefferson Street in Nederland.

 Prior to the musical portion of the program, Nederland Community Presbyterian Church member and Registered Nurse Paula Gipp will talk about her recent trip to Ethiopia where she learned about the remarkable work by the Catherina Hamlin Fistula Foundation and offer concert attendees the opportunity to support this life saving work through a love offering donation.

 The Catherine Hamlin Fistula Foundation (CHFF) is a non-profit organization dedicated to eradicating obstetric fistula, a devastating childbirth injury, by funding and supporting Hamlin Fistula Ethiopia. CHFF restores health and dignity to thousands of vulnerable women in Ethiopia.

 During her trip to Ethiopia last fall, Gipp learned that in 1959 the Emperor of Ethiopia placed an advertisement in newspapers around the world seeking a medical team to establish a maternal child health program in his country, as his daughter and grandchild had both recently died in childbirth. At that time, there was no professional prenatal or maternity care in Ethiopia.

 Australian surgeons Drs. Catherine and Reginald Hamlin answered that call for a three-year contract. The contract developed into a lifelong commitment to Ethiopia's maternal health care.  When they arrived in the African nation, they discovered that, due to the lack of maternity care, many women experienced prolonged ineffective labor, often resulting in stillborn births and extensive damage to the women’s organs.

These wounds resulted in permanent bladder and bowel incontinence. Suffering with these unsanitary and “offensive” conditions, the women were subsequently abandoned by their husbands and families and forced out of their villages to a life of isolation subsiding as best they could in the African bush.  

The Hamlins researched how to repair the fistulas and established the comprehensive Hamlin Model of Care to help the women. This Model of Care is now copied and practiced in many African countries that are also battling with these maternal health care issues.  

Gipp toured the Hamlin Midwifery college, two of the 90 maternal health clinics staffed by the Hamlin midwives, two hospitals, and traveled to six tribal villages to meet the women who now benefit from their services. She learned about the Project Zero effort to find the affected women still living in the bush, bring them in for surgical repairs and offer them a three month “whole patient” program providing literacy classes, counseling, women empowerment and vocational training with the goal of reuniting them with their families and successful reintegrating them into society.

Gipp, who serves as the Missions Elder at Nederland Community Presbyterian Church, thanked the many donors who contributed $6,000 to the Foundation which enabled her to travel on her self-funded Ethiopian trip.

Since 1974, 70,000 women have had their lives changed with fistula surgeries and reentries into their villages. Dr. Catherine Hamlin was honored for her work with nominations for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1999 and 2014. Gipp's mission now is to spread word among our communities about the continued work the Foundation is doing so Dr. Hamlin's goal of eradicating fistulas can be actualized.  

 For those who cannot attend the concert but wish to support the effort, donations can be electronically sent to catherinehamlin.org.

Margie Yansura

Nederland