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Dedicated midwives
For Nurul Idawati, 39, working as a midwife to provide public health services to people in far-off regions constitutes a form of social devotion.
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Unstoppable: Midwives Nurul Indawati (left) and her colleague Rurita cross a river to reach a remote village in Jombang, East Java. (Antara/Syaiful Arif)
T
wo women in uniforms carry a bag and a box of medical equipment at noon, while crossing a river and trekking down a footpath to Nampu, a remote hamlet in the East Java regency of Jombang, where they have a scheduled visit.
For Nurul Idawati, 39, working as a midwife to provide public health services to people in far-off regions constitutes a form of social devotion. She frequently has to cover a distance of 4 kilometers on foot, traversing rivers and village tracks.
But those challenges have never discouraged her over the last 15 years.
Assisted by independent midwife Rurita, she visits numerous integrated health centers every month, including one in Nampu. When the water at the river is too high to cross, she has to put off her health services for the village’s 44 families and five children under the age of five.
At the beginning of her assignment in 2001, she was worried about the rough terrain as well as the minimal facilities and infrastructure, but she has overcome those obstacles, as the local people always welcome her warmly and have high expectations for her helping hand.
The villagers’ support boosts Nurul’s determination to constantly improve her services, so as to reduce the rate of post-delivery mortality, through information and correct childbirth handling that poses no risk to women still all too accustomed to the traditional method of delivery.
