Community Based Rehabilitation

After months of meetings with local government authorities and other key parties, as well as planning, moving, and training, the day finally arrived – we opened our new office in Isfara…

“This community has helped my son to improve not only physically, but also mentally.”

Gulnoza truly brings sustained hope to the people she meets with. By caring for struggling individuals in this society, she is helping bring about the heart change that leads to life transformation.

The community based rehabilitation project in Rudaki provides early intervention and rehabilitation for children with disabilities and support for their parents.

Her confidence has grown immensely, and with this growth, she has begun to teach and train other mothers in a way that contributes to making Operation Mercy’s work in Isfara truly sustainable.

Alisher is a boy with autism, who struggles to interact well with his world, struggles with behaviour and attention and is not able to speak.

A community project in Tajikistan invites peers, children who do not have disabilities, to regularly attend rehabilitation activities six months before school starts.

Amina has grown in her capacity to advocate for children with disabilities, to encourage other mothers, and now has grown in confidence to share her knowledge and experience with the social assistance workers too.

Her mother speaks about Sumaya’s development with great happiness and joy. She says, “I didn’t expect to see this much development in my daughter, but now I see she can do a lot and will continue to make progress!”

“I love speaking to new mothers that come in for the first time and giving them advice and counselling them. I love seeing the change that this brings into a family.”

Corner chairs and walking frames are essential tools for the rehabilitation of children with disabilities and for increasing their quality of life. The training was aimed specifically at how to make these assistive devices.

A gentleman from the Ministry of Health approaches the podium at the 1st National CBR Conference in Dushanbe, Tajikistan. Six years ago we had a “friendship building experience,” in the form of a major argument over priorities for children with disabilities and where they live.

We believe engaging with the local community is essential to doing effective development work. By working with leaders and citizens, we can positively affect attitudes towards children with disabilities and encourage a sustainable integration of our projects into the community.

It is easy to think about development work only in terms of improving physical aspects of a community like economics or health. However, transformational development also means coming along-side the poor to help them spiritually and socially.

When asked about the experience, she said: “I was really happy to see that people did not notice just her disability, but they appreciated her ability.”