Learn From My Story: Obstetric Fistula
Obstetric fistula (a severe medical condition caused by obstructed vaginal delivery during childbirth) has a devastating effect on the lives of thousands of women and girls each year. The ACQUIRE project responded by working with national governments and local partners to strengthen existing and/or implement new comprehensive fistula initiatives. The ACQUIRE approach was holistic, collaborating with stakeholders at the facility and community levels on strategies that can prevent fistula from occurring in the first place, increase women’s access to clinical treatment and counseling, and provide rehabilitation services to help affected women reintegrate into their communities.
In 2007, Silence Speaks partnered with Engender Health’s Uganda-based ACQUIRE program on "Learn From My Story." The project piloted a storytelling-based support group intervention to support fistula patients with community reintegration following repair surgery, and to produce a collection of stories for use as health education, training, and advocacy tools. Following weeks of outreach by ACQUIRE collaborators, a group of women assembled in the Ugandan town of Masaka, where we guided them through a four-day workshop. The participants shared their stories as a group, recorded them with interpreter support, and chose photos from among those they had taken; we then combined these materials with other images and video clips to produce the finished stories. We produced a compilation DVD featuring the digital stories (in participants’ first languages with English subtitles and with overlaid English voiceovers) together with excerpts from a series of short video interviews with ACQUIRE fistula counselors and providers. ACQUIRE and EngenderHealth continue to use these materials as part of ongoing trainings about fistula treatment and care in Uganda and internationally.
