Supporting parents of thalassemia-stricken children
The project was aimed not only at serving ill children, but also their parents. Awareness sessions were held for Thalassemia children’s parents to educate them about the symptoms, its effects and ways of coping with the disease. Additionally, the center’s services were promoted through local media and social media platforms across the city in order to reach out to as many potential beneficiaries as possible.
In order to build trust between the team and children, New Horizons members accompanied the children from their homes on their way to the center. This has had a positive impact on the patients’ psyche. Both children and their parents reported great improvement after taking advantage of the new services . According to parents, visiting the center is no longer a struggle and children so far have not objected to going to their treatment sessions as they used to in the past, since they now actually enjoy attending them as they no longer associate them with blood transfusions and needles.
This positive improvement was reflected in the way children and their parents viewed the center and this change manifested itself in many ways. Three siblings accompanied their thalassemia-stricken brother to the blood transfusion center to participate alongside him in the activities. Other children did not leave the center after completing their blood transfusion sessions, because they wished to finish the activities they had started earlier.
Meanwhile, the blood center services also saw a major improvement following the addition of psychological support and entertainment activities to its program. As a result, many parents decided to depend on the Al-Raqqa center for blood transfusions after the quality of its services improved and there was no need for them to travel for long hours in order to take their children to better facilities that provided good services in Ain Al-Arab and Manbij.
