Data Analysis Chaparda 2017

Introduction

This was another very successful trip in terms of achieving the World Medicine aims of treating and supporting the deprived rural population in and around Chaparda, Gujarat. We exceeded our goals in many ways and responded creatively to the situations that arose on the ground. As ever we are incredibly grateful to the hospital staff, ashram and Bapu for the support and care they give to us, the lovely food, accommodation and thoughtfulness which then allows us to give of our best. We look forward to many more years of successful cooperative working.

We were a strong team of 6 experienced acupuncture volunteers (5 of whom had been to Chaparda before) and 5 translators, the largest team we have taken for our annual 2 week working ‘camp’ at the Jay Ambe hospital. We ran male and female “body” clinics and added an ear acupuncture clinic when patient numbers exceeded our capacity to cope.

Who were the patients?

Numbers: we have data for 502 patients and completed 1615 treatments in total.
Gender: we saw a total of 227 male patients and 275 female patients
We were very keen for patients to commit for 3+ treatments. This was based on previous findings that this improved the likelihood of better outcomes.  Therefore, for the following analyses we decided to exclude patients who had fewer than three treatments. The number of patients treated with 3 plus sessions was 321 (64% of 502 patients).
Outcomes:the coloured segments of the pie chart indicate the degree of improvement and the figures are the numbers of patients achieving that improvement.  Thus 232 patients reported at least a 50% improvement, and 42 patients said they had recovered completely.

Number of treatments given.

Of the cohort of patients who received 3+ treatments,patient numbers and individual treatments are compared to previous years:

Nature of conditions treated.

As in previous years the majority of patients (95%) presented with musculo-skeletal issues. This is no surprise given the age and lifestyle of the population and that the camp is mostly advertised for treatment of pain. However, there was some overlap with some patients presenting with multiple problems, for example, both lower back and shoulder pain. In addition, they also sought help with a variety of other issues such as digestive problems, respiratory problems, insomnia or cardiovascular issues. For this reason, the total number of conditions treated adds to 421 rather than 321.

These have been broken down into different subheadings in the table below.

The next camp is planned for January 2019, when a refreshed team of acupuncturists and translators will be visiting the Jay Ambe Hospital once again to deliver acupuncture treatments to as many of the local population as possible.  Plans are in place to hopefully exceed the excellent results of the 2017 visit, and for this we once again thank everyone at Chaparda for their friendship, hospitality and support in making these camps so successful.