Originally published in the Newborn Screening Newsletter
Official Publication of the Newborn Screening Reference Center
Vol. 15 Issue No. 4. October - December 2011
The Newborn Screening Center-Mindanao, together with the Volunteer Youth Leaders for Health–Mindanao Cluster, celebrated the Annual Newborn Screening Awareness Week with a special program, the Newborn Screening (NBS) Hour. The program was done with the simultaneous distribution of newborn screening materials throughout Mindanao by the VYLH Mindanao volunteers on October 5, 2011.
The NBS hour was passionately and enthusiastically joined in by volunteers from the cities of Zamboanga, Iligan, Cagayan de Oro, Malaybalay, Digos, and Davao. On the spotlight was the “The Pink Campaign” and “Pay it Forward” scheme developed by the VYLH Volunteers from Zamboanga City, Ms.Joan Mae Barredo. The scheme was initiated by giving Pink Brochures to students from Ateneo de Zamboanga. Each student, in turn, had a goal of distributing the NBS Pink Brochures to at least five people outside the school campus. Places visited by the students included houses, public utility vehicles, streets, fast foods, and other public places. Volunteers from other regions performed equally well with advocacy activities done in barangays, health centers, schools, streets, neighborhoods and subdivisions, malls, hospitals, government offices, public utility vehicles, and review centers.
What made the NBS hour more fun and interesting was that every volunteer was tasked to get a photo with the people they were advocating, upload it on Facebook, and tag all the VYLH representatives in the Mindanao region. Furthermore, as a gesture of overwhelming gratitude and appreciation, a customized NBS Tumbler was given to VYLH Mindanao volunteers who participated and submitted their activity reports.
Indeed, all these efforts helped in enriching public awareness on NBS and generating support from concerned sectors.
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* Edbert Jasper Jover, RN is a Researcher
and Birth Defects Surveillance Nurse at the Newborn Screening Center -
Mindanao (NSC-Min) which is located at the Southern Philippines Medical
Center, Davao City. He is also the VYLH-Philippines Mindanao Cluster
Secretariat.
