Dear FNAME,
Last week we announced our Matched Giving Day on October 14. If this message has crossed paths with your donation, I thank you for your compassionate response.
The majority of Timor-Leste’s population (69%) lives in regional and rural communities. For many, the tyranny of distance makes it extremely challenging for people to access basic health care, let alone effective cardiac diagnostic technology to screen for Rheumatic Heart Disease (RHD), which effects 1 in 28 people in Timor-Leste.
With early identification RHD can be prevented and treated via a prophylaxis program or as a last resort, overseas surgery. Tragically, 1 in 5 patients have heart disease so advanced that even surgery is no longer an option to save their lives. However, for the others diagnosis and intervention will save their lives.
We urgently need to provide at least 10 portable echocardiography machines which will be sent to five regional areas during this first year. Deploying portable echo machines to community health centres will provide a more accurate identification of RHD in regional communities. Early identification and treatment of RHD can prevent patients, many of whom are young children, from suffering debilitating and life-threatening heart disease.
We aim to screen 5,000 patients in the first year, which will likely result in saving approximately 1,000 young lives.
