By Jocelyn W Bonner, MD
“Returning” to West Africa in January 2020 as an African- American psychiatrist was especially rewarding due to a site visit to Saint Camille Association in Benin. Gregoire, the founder, is gracious and humble, but with a fierce determination to better the lives of the mentally ill.
The most special day for me was seeing patients outdoors, under the palm trees, at the relay station in Ouidah. Relay stations are outpatient clinics set up to see patients primarily in follow-up or new patients to establish a treatment plan. Counseling and medications are options. Saint Camille uses whatever spaces are made available in the community. Parents brought in their 19 year- old daughter. She was short for her age, deaf, blind, intellectually impaired and aggressive since she had a bout of meningitis at age 10. Her mother showed us her hands where she had been bitten by her daughter. I can still hear her father explaining to us, in English, her father explained there are no services for her “not like in your country.” Suggestions were made regarding medications by the clinic doctor and her father guided her away by her shoulders. He was grateful. I was astonished and sad for her, knowing the US resources that could easily make her life a little better. I met many families whose resilience in taking care of their loved ones left a lasting impression.
More encounters to follow.
