serving the homeless with Barnabus Andy Meeson goes out with the medical van
B arnabus 1 is a Christian
charity in Manchester that aims to share the
gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ with homeless people, prostitutes and prisoners. During the day, its headquarters, ‘The Beacon’, provides breakfast, washing facilities, Bible studies, friendship and advice. Evenings see volunteers descend on the streets from minibuses, offering companionship, food, drink, and medical advice or treatment.
Two years ago, I started volunteering once a week. I turned up on my first night expecting to be nice and chatty, and perhaps give out drinks. To my surprise I was asked, ‘are you the doctor?’ After explaining that I was only a student, I was reassured that was ‘good enough’ and I was shown to the medical van along with two nurses. After a time of prayer, God had provided them with people to run a medical van, and I turned out to be one of them!
medical needs abound
I have seen a multitude of medical needs in the people we serve. The usual complaints are
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only one). The local A&E department, I am told, often treats the homeless with irritation and cynicism. So we are frequently their first port of call, along with NHS primary care drop-in centres.
foot lesions, mainly from walking the streets all day in poorly fitting shoes, through Manchester’s infamous wet weather. Other common presentations are injuries caused by drug or alcohol abuse, such as abscesses at injection sites, broken needles in veins, or head wounds from blackouts and seizures. We also see complaints ranging from chest pain to depressive symptoms – much like a GP surgery or hospital accident and emergency (A&E) department. Ultimately, the treatment we can offer is limited (we cannot prescribe, for example), so our role is mainly advisory.
Very few GPs in Manchester accept patients without an address (I currently know of
Primary care access is not the only issue the homeless face; a big problem, in my opinion, is the homeless person with a chronic disease. They will often miss appointments because they have no fixed address to receive letters. A particular man with type one diabetes comes to mind; he presented with a large foot ulcer having not taken insulin for years.
One thing I am certain of is that the people I come into contact with at Barnabus do not receive the same level of healthcare as I would. Illness prevention is neglected in this group; instead crisis management and hospital admissions are all too often the mainstay of medical care.
see their spiritual need
The most important thing that I have learned is that these people need to be told about Jesus Christ. We can look after them;
nucleus christmas ‘08
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