School Health Screening Program (Saragur, India)

In 2008 at the request of our partners in India, Swami Vivekananda Youth Movement (SVYM), IPOP helped design and launch the School Health Screening Program in rural Karnataka State.

The primary goal of the program was to promote the health of children in an underserved area of India with a large population of marginalized tribal people, who often do not seek medical care for their children until a catastrophic illness occurs. The goal is to identify children suffering from malnutrition and other common or chronic illnesses, and connect them to health care at SVYM or another appropriate hospital in the area. This program also provides universal treatment for intestinal parasitic infections and Vitamin A deficiency (a leading cause of preventable blindness).  The screening process was comprehensive, including: demographic information, vision screening, dental screening, height and weight measurements, full medical exam from head to toe, and written referrals for health conditions identified that would benefit from follow-up.

As with all of our programs, our approach was not only focused on health-service delivery but also the education of local providers. Our volunteer pediatricians trained local staff and rotating medical interns to independently perform this screening. At each school, we also conducted a general health education session for the entire student body and their teachers. The data collected is now being used to improve nutritional services and health-care access for underserved children in this part of India. Additionally, with successive visits to schools over several years, we plan to track individual and aggregate outcomes and the impact of specific interventions aimed at reducing the local burden of chronic childhood illness and disease.