“Burn Wound After Care Backpacks”- project

In May 2024, Pediatric Care Africa partnered with Dr. Elliot Motloung, the only pediatric surgeon in Mpumalanga province, to establish a burns ward for children in the Pediatric Surgery Department of Rob Ferreira Hospital in Nelspruit.

The burn center is now a reality, but the aftercare and healing of burns, however, is not an easy-fix and can take months sometimes years, depending on the severity of the burns.

By talking with doctors on duty and having conversations with parents, we found out that once a child is “discharged” from the hospital, the care of wounds etc needs to continue at home and this often leaves much to be desired. Many parents often do not have the resources, knowledge and experience to care for the wounds and the nearest clinic does not always stock the right resources either.

For this reason we want to start a new project: “Burn Wound Aftercare Backpack”, where the child treated in the burn centre in Rob Ferreira will receive a backpack with all the necessary dressings, creams etc and instructions to take home, so that the parents can continue the wound care at home adequately, thus reducing the risk of infection of the wounds and promote a successful healing. Pediatric Care Africa, apart from helping with maintenance etc of the burn ward itself, will continue to be involved in this way with the burn ward in Rob Ferreira hospital.

These backpacks include the following:

1. dressings, (sterile) gauze, hypo-allergic wound dressings, plasters
2. wound disinfectant
3. silver sulfadiazine creams, latex gloves, burn care cream
4. medication for pain relief
5. a pamphlet with information for deck on how to care for wounds at home.

The cost per “Burn Wound Aftercare backpack” is R 2000-00 per backpack.

The duration of this project will cover approximately one year and we intend to provide as many as 150 backpacks to the burn centre in Rob Ferreira Hospital in Nelspruit.