Barriers to Treatment
Women suffering with untreated fistula or severe perineal tears are some of the world’s most vulnerable individuals.
Living primarily in rural areas of Africa and Asia, they endure the burden of debilitating injuries on top of crushing poverty and gender inequality. There are three main barriers that prevent them from accessing the care they need:
Stigma and lack of awareness
Women with untreated fistula and tears often live in rural communities in Africa and Asia. Some may not even be aware that they are suffering from known, treatable conditions—they simply believe that they are cursed. Too often, they are ridiculed by their neighbors and cast out of their families because of their smell. Many hide themselves in shame.
Community education and outreach are vital to finding and treating the vast backlog of women suffering from these injuries.
Poverty
Poverty is another major barrier to treatment. The cost of surgery and rehabilitation is out of reach for nearly all patients with fistula and severe tears.
What’s more, too few hospitals in Africa and Asia offer repair surgery, which means most women must travel long distances for help, adding to the total cost of care. Public transportation can be challenging for a woman with incontinence, because of her odor.
Inadequate healthcare systems
A lack of adequately trained surgeons has long been a barrier to scaling up treatment for these injuries. Repair surgeries are difficult to perform, and require special training. There are simply not enough surgeons to meet the need. Moreover, many women live in countries where it is not culturally acceptable to be treated by male physicians, and female surgeons are scarce.
Compounding this shortage of surgeons, many hospitals lack adequate capacity to keep up with the volume of patients in need of care.
Nicholas D. KristofThose suffering fistulas are completely voiceless – young, female, poor, rural, and ostracized. They are the 21st century’s lepers.
Fistula Foundation works to end the suffering caused by devastating childbirth injuries because we believe that no woman should endure a life of misery, simply for trying to bring a child into the world.