15 year old Sopheatra Lon from the Maddox Chivan Children's Center (MCCC) receiving a medal at the Bangkok Internationl Equestrian Competition in December 2010
Cambodian national equestrian champion MCCC's 17 year old Narith Sim paracticing the course at the Bangkok International Competition in December 2010.
Children and adolescents infected and affected by HIV frequently face decreased educational opportunities, lack of social and emotional support, lack of adequate health care, increased hunger and malnutrition, and increased susceptibility to abuse and exploitation.
To date, CHC's Maddox Chivan Children's Center (MCCC) in Phnom Penh has offered its unique program of multidisciplinary outpatient and social/educational care to almost 1000 Cambodian children infected or affected by HIV/AIDS, a quarter of whom are HIV+. Currently, in December 2010, the MCCC provides active educational, medical and/or nutritional support for over 300 children from 179 families and provides lunch for approximately 130 children each day .
From the outset, in addition to children infected with HIV, the MCCC focused on those children who although not HIV infected themselves were profoundly touched by AIDS—those orphaned or caring for ill parents and who were typically out of school and living in crushing poverty, with inadequate food. The Maddox aims to respond in a comprehensive way to the needs experienced by HIV infected and affected children by offering multidisciplinary care in a day care outpatient setting. This includes general medical treatment for AIDS affected and infected children, antiretroviral and opportunistic treatment for children who need it (approximately 60 children currently receive their primary AIDS care at the MCCC), HIV counselling and general counselling as needed, provision of a daily nutritious lunch and snacks, educational support, social work, counseling (through art therapy, peer groups, life skills workshops), sports and creative activities, English, computer, etc. The MCCC Social work team provides social support to parents and caregivers.
The MCCC program is integrated with the CHC-assisted KFSH pediatric ward and Sullivan outpatient center, which increases its impact to the over 350 HIV+ children who receive their primary AIDS care there. The social, counseling and integrated approaches pioneered at the Maddox have been offered to these children who have the opportunity to participate in the educational and social programs at the MCCC.
A major accomplishment of 2010 has been the completion of the Maddox Counseling Manual for HIV+ children of different ages, which helps caregivers support HIV-infected children to understand their disease and the therapy they must take lifelong.
The teenager program at the Maddox continued to grow with 80 teenagers involved in computer classes, educational activities and peer support groups. A shining moment in the past month was the participation of two of teenagers from the MCCC who were members of the first Cambodian Equestrian team to participate in an international competition. Both kids took home medals in their respective levels in show jumping and Lon Sopheatra won an overall second place in the competition. This was the result of a 4 year long collaboration with the Cambodian Equestrian Center.
Some of the younger children at the MCCC