30 years and counting: Nurse Elaine Thomas delivered over 200 babies

By Alva Solomon

In 1988, a team of regional officials was on a visit to the village of Santa Cruz, which sits on the Waini River close to the mouth of the Barama River in the North West District, Region One (Barima-Waini). The visit was, among other things, aimed at recruiting community health workers (CHWs) to support the health-care system in the region.

At the time, Elaine Thomas was only 16 years old, and had just completed school. She lived with her father and stepmother, since her mother had passed away a few years prior, and was working as a general domestic at a guest house in the village. While the regional officials were holding the meeting, they requested the names of three persons from the village for training to become CHWs. Thomas received a message that she was wanted at the meeting, and she immediately hurried over. Thomas was then confronted with a life-changing offer by the Regional Chairman: he asked Thomas if she wished to be trained as a midwife, and she accepted the offer.
Despite her small stature as a teenager, Thomas was excited about the new venture. “I was making $20 per day at the guest house, and I was working for a few months at the time. So, when they selected me, I said yes and the Regional Chairman, Mr. Ward, asked the Medex to ensure I sit the test to be selected,” Thomas recounted to Guyana Times recently.
After successfully completing the test, she was instructed by the regional officials to prepare to travel out to Mainstay village on the Essequibo Coast, where the CHW training was undertaken.
“I used to live with my parents, but they couldn’t afford to take care of me. The manager at the guest house offered me some money, and so I got to travel,” Thomas said.

Too young
When she turned up at the Regional Administrative Office at Anna Regina to commence preparations for the CHW training, Thomas said, a regional official mentioned that she was too young to venture into Mainstay for the training session.
“So, he went to the person in charge, and she said no, I should go, that I would make it,” Thomas recalled.
Then when she arrived at the training facility, the trainer also remarked that she seemed too young. “But then they said they will give me a break and allow me to be trained,” she recalled. Two months later, she had successfully completed the training.
After the successful trip to Mainstay, Thomas went back to the village of Santa Cruz to commence work. She remained there until 2001, carrying out her duties within the village and at communities within the Barama and Waini Rivers. She recalled that she always upgraded her knowledge in whatever training session was offered by the health authorities. This included a trip to the Rupununi in 1990 for two months, when she was among the first batch of community health workers in Guyana to be trained in microscopy, which entails undertaking smears/testing for malaria. With this newfound knowledge, Thomas said, she travelled the length and breadth of the North West District to undertake malaria testing and diagnosis.

Midwifery and nursing
In 2001, Thomas said, she received a message that she should prepare to travel to Georgetown to commence training in nursing and midwifery. At the time, she had just given birth to her third child. She said her extended family and neighbours at Santa Cruz provided her much needed support as she undertook the training in the city.
She recalled that from 2001 to 2003, she trained to become a registered nurse. “I passed, and then I went back to Santa Cruz,” she recalled. By then the Medex who was based in the upriver village of Kwebana had retired, and Thomas was asked to work at the health centre there until a replacement could be found.
She spent four years there, during which she developed a liking for the community and her children were already in school there. “I was asked to go back to Santa Cruz, but I had already started life at Kwebana,” she recalled.
She had travelled back to the city to undertake training in midwifery, and around 2006, after completing that training session, her duties and ties to the latter village increased. She made that village her home until today. She built her home and settled in at the village.

Over 200 babies
As time passed Thomas, continued to upgrade her medical knowledge by taking part in training offered to her by health authorities. She said she was exposed to training in cancer screening last year as she continues to boost her medical knowledge.
With a smile, Thomas said she has been delivering babies throughout her medical career, and she noted that while the number of deliveries is more than 200, it may be close to 300, given the number of pregnancies she has handled annually throughout her career of more than 30 years.

Her first delivery, she noted, were twins. “It was a boy and a girl. The girl died some years after, but the boy is now around 34 years old. He visited me some time ago,” she said, as she laughed. She said she delivered the babies at Kwebana, noting that mothers would journey to the health centre there from villages along the Waini and Barama Rivers.
While she has years of hands-on experience, Thomas said, she does not take on the high-risk cases, and those are usually handled at the Kumaka Hospital in Santa Rosa, or are referred further if the case is deemed too risky. She said the riskier cases are usually mothers who are pregnant for the first time, or the older ones who may have a complicated medical history. She said there are mothers who may not have attended clinic prior to giving birth, and as such, delivering the babies without knowledge of the mother’s medical history can be a challenge. Thomas said, however, that she is always in contact with other medical professionals at Kumaka, and as such, she would seek advice from the doctors there if the case is too risky for her to handle.
There are usually other cases where people may have a heart condition, or they may have sustained a wound. Those cases, she said, are usually handled first at the health centre before the persons are referred to the Kumaka hospital.

Retirement
Thomas is spending much of her time grooming the young community health workers at the Kwebana Health Centre, and she noted that she has implored that they continue to enhance their knowledge of the field.
“Hilton is the CHW who has a lot of experience, and I have been passing on my knowledge to him,” she added.
She said that, during her career, there were situations which required her to treat patients based on her own knowledge and experience; and this, she noted, is key to the CHW’s career.
These days, Thomas spends time with her grandchildren on her farm at Santa Cruz. She says she has another four years until retirement, and while those days are numbered, she isn’t sure if she would hang up her gloves just yet. “I plan to stick around and relax at the same time,” Thomas said.
She said she has given her all to the field, and is proud to be a nurse who has made a difference in the lives of many families.