Two nurses walk miles for medical visits to the Kachanik area

To the vicinity of the village, they are shipped by the driver of the main Family Medicine Centre in Kacanic, and the rest of them walk on rural streets because most of them are mainly in mountainous areas.

The purpose of these visits by nurses is to care for the health of their children and mothers. Mamaa Teuta Isufi-Dogani told Radio Free Europe that within the month they are conducting about 100 visits to different families.

“We knew these challenges would await us. We also know the terrain, that the terrain is hilly-malal. Part of the road belongs to them to bring us to the village (by car), the rest of us walk by ourselves. We walk more than five kilometers. It's not just five kilometers, it's more. It's hard, it's not easy, we're faced with many difficulties. Sometimes it's bad weather, it's raining or it's either snow and frosty, but yet you've succeeded in doing it”, she said.

In the context of the visits, midwife Teuta and nurse Adriana Lika visited a mother and her three-month-old child in the village of Gajre, which is a few miles from Kachanik. Nurse Adriana Lika said visits to the house have resulted in success.

We're in the village of Gaius today. We were visiting the Sahin family. The baby's mother was very pleased with our visits and was well informed about the breast-life, about the infant's vaccination, as well as the checks on the pediatrics had been handled correctly. It is a great pleasure for us to see the results of our visits”, said nurse Lika.

In the meantime, Aferdita Sahin, who brought her daughter back to life a few months ago, said that visits by nurses have been very helpful.

The important “is very, normal that it also helps you, and it is very good when they come and visit and advise. It's good for me and I think that for all the families that need to go to counsel for children and mothers, it's very good”, Aferdita Sahin said.

Health Ministry officials say 150,000 visits to homes in various Kosovo municipalities have been conducted over the past year.

Albattri Matoshi, adviser to the minister of health, told Radio Free Europe that these medical home visits are currently conducted in 16 Kosovo municipalities. The project for medical home visits, according to Mattosh, had begun to help young children and mothers.

In particular, young mothers or even mothers in countries in poorer municipalities have been exposed to various diseases, to child rearing in a quality manner. Seeing the success it has had, it is being supported and expanded across the entire territory of Kosovo”, Matoshi said.

Domestic medical visits are being conducted by the Health Ministry with the support of the UNICEF Office and the funding of the Luxembourg Government.