I’m taking the lead on this article to introduce perspectives of our recent work with the Ghana Homeopathy Project from several members of our lasting and ever-growing team. I was a previous coordinator for the project from 2014-2017 and am now a trustee of the charity that oversees the project, Homeopathy in Africa, UK Registered Charity No.1125981
I’ve therefore watched it grow and with the most recent cohort of more than twenty graduates getting ready to go out and practice in and around Ghana, there is still much work to do in terms of support and CPD and always patients needing treatment in outreach, plus our now five partnered clinics around Ghana.
I was last in Ghana in February 2020 just before lockdowns started across the world. The graduates had, at that time, very recently finished their Society of Homeopaths accredited, four-year diploma course when all came to a standstill. They were, by necessity of lockdowns and change of staff, left unable to move forward in their quest to become practitioners.
Two years later in May 2022, with an injection of new and nearly-new board members and a new coordinator, we got to work as soon as possible to support the grads in the most relevant and supportive ways with a mentored CPD programme to refresh their knowledge and competencies and to help them with the legal and financial necessities of practising as homeopaths in Ghana.
It was also important to arrange a final graduation event (photos below). How that was achieved you can read more about further on in the article from one of our new members of staff – Ghana Liaison Officer (Isaac Gasika).
That was another important development. More staff based in Ghana for on the ground human support. As useful as digitisation is, it never beats one-to-one, in person contact. We now have a Practitioner Development Officer (Grace Rhoomes) and as above, a Ghana Liaison Officer.
We also had our previous well-experienced coordinator, Richard Pitt, offer to take on a new role as Education Officer, since the appointment of Caroline Jurdon, just this September, as GHP General Coordinator, who will be Ghana-based for several months each year.
All four of us, including GHP Founder, Linda Shannon, myself, Caroline and Richard, as soon as Ghana allowed entry in September 2023, purchased tickets to finally fly back to Ghana. This article also includes two interesting cases from father (Emperor, our very first Ghanaian grad) and son (Selassi) homeopaths based at Hope Homeopathy Clinic in the rural village of Mafi Kumase in Volta region of south-east Ghana.
GHANA HOMEOPATHY PROJECT 10 YEARS ON
by Linda Shannon GHP Founder
(Linda with helpers at Mafi Kumase)
Returning to Ghana after a gap of 10 years was a heart-warming experience. My role has evolved over time, and recently I’ve been UK based as joint Chair of Trustees. I first travelled to Ghana in 2005, equipped with some homeopathic first-aid kits, plans to teach an introductory course, and the vision to play a part in sharing some of my passion for homeopathy with the people I met there.
Having had the privilege of working for many years with some of India’s great classical homeopaths and seeing the impressive results in homeopathic treatment at village level in India, I knew homeopathy could potentially be of great benefit in Ghana where many of the health issues and living conditions are similar.
Many were keen to learn how to use a home prescribing kit, but it was Emperor Tsamenyi, the director of a primary care centre in the Volta region of Ghana, who felt called to train and become a professional homeopath. This interest led to the founding of the Ghana Homeopathy Project. Over the years we have worked together with Ghanaian homeopaths and students to train more than 30 people to a professional level.
Many volunteers, from the UK, USA, Australia and Europe have travelled to Ghana to teach and mentor in clinics. There are too many to name but their contribution has been invaluable.
We have worked together with Ghanaian homeopaths: Grace Rhoomes, Julius Berdie and Bonsu Boaten, so we have a strong foundation of trained homeopaths in our team there. There are presently five partnered clinics in Ghana, which are well-stocked with books and remedies. The focus currently, has been helping the graduates establish their practice.
The development of the project from initial vision to its present form has not been without its many challenges. With each obstacle we have looked at how to best solve it. At one point, this involved a wide-ranging external evaluation to set us back on course.
What we have now, is a strong team of committed homeopaths and graduates, both in the UK, and in Ghana. It has been a great privilege to play a part in the evolving journey of the Ghana Homeopathy Project and I’d like to offer my deep gratitude to all who have given their time and energy.
Find further details of our beginnings at: www.ghanahomeopathyproject.org/history
THE MAGIC OF BARYTA CARB –
A Case by Samuel Tsamenyi (Emperor)
(Carlos)
15yr-old Kumah Carlos, was brought to the clinic on the 5th April 2023 after all the hospitals they’d visited, had yielded no results. There were lots of complications during pregnancy and delivery. The mother bled during the first trimester but was helped with allopathic medicine.
Delivery was delayed but came vaginally. According to his father, they realised in the fifth month that the child could not sit up or hold his neck up either and saw that his lower limbs were weak. Carlos was able to walk after two years and then his mother divorced and left the child with his father.
When Carlos started walking, his father said he noticed in the little boy: incontinence of both urine and stool, delayed talking and teething, very forgetful, dribbling of saliva at night, large abdomen, fearful at the presence of people and a fast heart rate. His temperament was good and he would not even cry when hungry.
Carlos couldn’t go to school due to all his problems. Despite eating well, he still didn’t thrive and no school would accept him. His father was compelled to take him to farm every day, since no one would look after him. Carlos also developed fever at night with a dry cough. I gave the boy Baryta carb 30c split dose on the first day.
In July, his father brought him for a follow up and said he had seen several changes in him and the incontinence was now in the past. I stayed with the same potency of 30c, because we never change a winning formula. In the first week of October, he was brought to me again and almost all the symptoms were gone except the fear and his ability to thrive.
I then increased the potency to 200c, to see if the mind symptoms would also improve. Carlos is now in school and in class one. The father is very happy and has agreed that we put his son’s photo in our Newsletter.
MY FIRST TRIP TO GHANA
– by Caroline Jurdon- GHP General Coordinator
(Caroline with Emperor & Selassi)
It was my first time in Ghana and I found it fascinating and amazing and sometimes overwhelming. As the new project coordinator, I fortunately went with a very experienced UK homeopathic crew:
Linda Shannon, the project’s founder who first came to Ghana in 2005 with the vision of establishing homeopathy there, and two previous project coordinators Jacqueline Smith and Richard Pitt.
The Ghana Homeopathy Project was celebrating the graduation of twenty-two homeopaths who have completed our most recent four-year training course. We held a 2-day seminar towards the end of our stay. Their course has recently been recognised by the Ghanaian government under the Traditional Medicine Practitioner’s Council (TMPC) as well as the UK Society of Homeopaths.
It is an extraordinary achievement to have such a large a group of new practitioners and share their enthusiasm for homeopathy; many of them experiencing very challenging cases with severe pathology, which we rarely have access to in the West.
We travelled, visiting homeopathic clinics in the Volta region, near the border with Togo, including Hope Homeopathy Clinic. It was built by the Ghana Homeopathy Project and is run by a Ghanaian team, and is often the first port of call for those with few resources.
We saw many patients and amongst other pathologies, many cases of malaria. We also travelled to Kumasi, the second largest city in Ghana where a homeopathic clinic is just beginning, and shared the challenges of starting a new venture.
Some of the new graduates are working from home, others are running outreach clinics in remote communities practicing homeopathy under a tree. They are certainly part of an exciting, new and growing homeopathic community in Ghana.
We also were able, together with our Ghanaian friends, to honour the memory of Angie Metzger who sadly died earlier this year. She worked tirelessly for the Ghana Project over many years as coordinator and trustee and had a big part in making this project the success it has become.
AWARDS NIGHT FOR GRADUATES IN GHANA
-SEPTEMBER 24TH 2023
by Isaac Gasika Ghana Liaison Officer
(Isaac Gasika and with Linda, Richard & Emperor receiving his certificate)
During the recent visit of founder, co-ordinators, trustees etc., from Homeopathy in Africa (GHP), a seminar was held in Kasoa, Accra for all the graduates, both new and old. Among the visiting team were Linda Shannon, Caroline Jurdon, Jacqueline Smith and Richard Pitt.
The evening of the first day, which was the 24th of September 2023, there was an awards ceremony. This ceremony was designed to present the graduates with various certificates. In all, 22 graduates received certificates. The certificates presented were:
(i) 22 Licentiate certificates after the completion of the practitioner course.
(ii) 16 CPD certificates; organized from October 2022 to June, 2023.
(iii) 14 TMPC practitioner registration certificates.
(iv) 1 TMPC premises registration license.
The event was blended with music and dancing, which added joy to the entire program. The graduates were so happy and very grateful to HIA because of the certificates they had obtained, especially the practitioner certificates from the Ministry of Health in Ghana through the Traditional Medicine Practice Council (TMPC).
During the celebration, speeches were given by each of the visiting team members and Hope Homeopathy Clinic Director, Emperor. The graduates were then called one by one to receive their certificates.
INSIDE HOPE HOMEOPATHY CLINIC
Mafi Kumase, Ghana by Patrick Tsamenyi (Selassi)
(Before treatment After treatment Selassi treating a patient’s wound)
It is a GHP founded clinic situated in the Volta region of Ghana and boasts a clinic building, library. consulting rooms and pharmacies. One of the pharmacies houses all the remedies for GHP alumni now practicing in Ghana. At the clinic, we see lots of patients from across the country and sometimes from our neighbouring countries like Togo and Ivory Coast. Our charges are very moderate and sometimes free for the vulnerable. We treat both acute and chronic cases.
CHALLENGES
Over the years, we were faced with an inadequate supply of remedies but this year, GHP has been able to supply a big enough stock of remedies for the whole country, all in the central store at Mafi Kumase at Hope Homeopathy Clinic.
Another major challenge is lack of education for the people about homeopathy and remedies and we have to create time to educate them whenever they come to the clinic to seek medical care! Another challenge is that most of our patients visit the clinic at odd hours without prior information, especially accident victims!
ONE OF OUR SUCCESSFUL CASES
A case of a one and a half year old baby girl from Kumasi in the Ashanti region, was brought to our clinic in January 2022 with difficulty walking. Pregnancy was okay but delivery was by caesarean and baby couldn’t cry after delivery.
Her fontanelle was also not closed when she was brought to the clinic, dentition was poor but her appetite was okay for breast milk but she had a problem latching on to the mother’s nipple during breast feeding. She was given *Calc. Carb 30c powder* repeated dose and after three months she was able to stand up without the mother’s support! We waited and watched and after another two months, she started walking! *
LOOKING TO THE FUTURE OF GHP
by Richard Pitt – Education Officer
(Richard Pitt with Gasika & Sabah)
While recently in Ghana, we also started a new Ghanaian charity to support the work of the UK based charity, Homeopathy in Africa. The new charity is called Homeopathy Education and Practitioners Association (HEPA) and we are now in the process of setting up our professional, student and general membership of this new organisation.
We are also planning to offer an advanced training in Pathology and Disease, a booster catch-up programme for some students who didn’t complete the full training before, as well as ongoing CPD programmes.
We are also planning to look at developing a one-year post-graduate training programme for medically trained personnel, so that homeopathy can be made available within the Ghanaian healthcare system. We are hoping to use this same educational model in other African countries as well.
Therefore, the community of homeopaths in Ghana is growing and there is a need for our charity in the UK and now in Ghana to help evolve the professional development of Ghanaian homeopathy even further. Fifteen years of work has definitely paid its dividends and now we are in a new phase of the project.
My role is now changing since I have resigned as coordinator to take on a new role as Education Officer for the project. Caroline Jurdon has now taken over the General Co-ordinator position and will continue the work, alongside the HIA Board of Trustees.
We will be looking for a few experienced volunteers to join us next year, who will be willing to travel to Ghana for up to two months and work in our various clinical areas. This is an opportunity for people who have at least five years of experience and who want to travel to an African country and see how homeopathy is being practiced there and to be able to help in a variety of interesting clinical settings.
There is something very stimulating and interesting in being able to work in an African context, especially turning up in a village somewhere and working under the mango tree. Homeopathy comes alive in these times in such a direct way and it can be a great experience.
It is also good to be able to share one’s experience with local homeopaths, some of whom have a lot of experience while others are learning the ropes in clinical practice. If you are interested in participating in our work and would like to be a volunteer for the project, do contact us and we can see how we can work together and further help the evolution of homeopathy in Ghana.
Finally, it was also time to give thanks and to honour the memory of one of our long-term trustees, Angie Metzger, a founding member who had given many years of selfless work for the project but who unfortunately passed away earlier this year. Many of our Ghanaian friends knew her well, so it was fitting for us to be able to honour her memory during our visit there.
GRATITUDE & FUNDRAISING CHALLENGES
We are always looking for continued support as we plan our programme for 2024-25. We have been fortunate to receive ongoing support from Charles Wansborough, a long-term supporter of the project. We have also appreciated the support of The Tanner Trust over the years. Additionally, we are working with The Welsh School of Homeopathy as well as The Society of Homeopaths and this gives us an excellent foundation to work with as we consider future educational goals in Ghana and other African countries under the auspices of our charity, Homeopathy in Africa.
Money as ‘One Off’ gifts or Regular donations of any amount: please arrange with, deposit in or transfer to:
CO-OPERATIVE BANK PLC
PO Box 250 Skelmersdale, Lancs. WN8 6WT
Account “Homeopathy in Africa” R/C 112598
Account no. 65318708 Sort code 08-92-99
OR donate via Givey.com under our registered charity name: “Homeopathy in Africa”
THANK YOU FROM ALL OF US!
We need you!
As well as volunteer homeopaths to travel to Ghana,
If you have Financial, Minute-taking, Digital marketing or Website skills
Contact us at: [email protected]
After our Seminar & Graduation Ceremony 25th September 2023
Dear Jacqueline,
I thank you, Richard Pitt and the others involved in this wonderful project. Your work helped so many people who had few resources. You also planted the seeds of homeopathy which will improve the lives of more generations to come.