In 1989, a health center changed the direction of the María Elena neighborhood, in the town of Gregorio de Laferrere. With the aim of carrying out the task of social medicine, health professionals and students founded a space that neighbors could call their own. At the same time, its promoters trained in health to be able to offer comprehensive health care.
35 years later, the health agent courses taught in the Dr. Olivieri health room are one of the main activities that characterizes this space. They offer a wide spectrum of responses to the problems that have been incorporated over the years.
Hugo Pollola, social psychologist of the room, informed The 1 which are carried out every year; They begin in mid-April and continue throughout the school year. In addition, since 2001 the health center has had an agreement with a nursing school in Hurlingham. This is how they provide scholarships to two or three graduates of the healthcare agents course to continue with their Nursing career, with a one hundred percent scholarship.
“We encourage students to continue with a professional career and ensure that they return to the classroom with other knowledge and professionalism,” Pollola said. Originally, the promoters of the space sought to have one health agent per block of the neighborhood. This objective was greatly exceeded, and now, the graduates also work in neighboring neighborhoods.
For his part, Dr. Jorge Orellano highlighted that they seek to train people who “cooperate and help in health work.” “Comprehensive health and social medicine is not just about curing diseases. We must also prevent and understand the importance of habitat and its influence on health. That is our difference,” he told this medium.
The Dr. Olivieri health room
This space began its activities in 1989. At that time, the María Elena neighborhood was a settlement of no more than seven years old, and it did not have any health infrastructure. The neighborhood council began to work on the idea of having its own care in the neighborhood, made up of more than a thousand families.
Doctor Néstor “Chino” Olivieri, together with nurse Mónica Correa, designed and promoted this project. “The idea was to add arms, incorporate neighbors, through training on health care. The course was, and continues to be, a demand that transcended the possibilities of supply,” Correa explained to The 1.
The training of agents made it possible to address neighborhood concerns that, at that time, could not be reached. “We went out with the health agents, we met with neighbors, we vaccinated and provided care. Delegates even lent their houses. We did a more comprehensive job. At the beginning it was expensive, it was not easy. “We worked with a scholarship that was renewed every few months,” he recalled.
Currently, there are 50 members of the room’s team. According to Pollola, 16 of them are rented and earn a salary. For each one of them, there are three cooperative members. All of them continue with the task of social medicine that Olivieri carried out, until his death in 2015.
“The room is a reference center, a place where you can go not only for health problems. It fulfills a task beyond health, it is a commitment,” explained Jorge Orellano.
