OdishaPlus Bureau
Asha The Hope, the rehabilitation centre for the divyangs run by JSPL Foundation at Angul, reached out to the needy children and their parents though mobile telephone and home visits amid COVID19. Therapists of the centre guided the parents to practice home based therapy guided by live and/or recorded video sessions. The therapists also visited some of the children to guide their parents to practice ‘Home Exercise protocol’, therapeutic skills, pre-vocational learning activities and educational activities. The therapists maintained social distancing norms as well as proper sanitation and use of masks during the visits.
“Asha the Hope is one of the key initiatives in JSPL Foundation. I am happy that during the pandemic when the children with special needs are not able to reach the rehabilitation centres, the foundation has been reaching their door steps enabling need based consultation & special services to them,” said Ms. Shallu Jindal, Chairperson of JSPL Foundation.
The Centre has conducted more than 1200 online sessions through video calls and made short videos to educate the parents to continue therapy of their children during the lockdown period. “Rehabilitation of persons with disabilities and children with special needs is a continuous process and any kind of discontinuity may result in degradation of the acquired knowledge and skill. Therefore the centre assisted the parents to continue the service through online sessions and home visits,” said Mr. Prashant Hota, President and Group Head (CSR & Sustainability) of JSPL.
Mrs. Kalyani Nath, the mother of Roshan Nath, a child undergoing occupational therapy and physiotherapy treatment said, “After enrolling my child in Asha the Hope, I found improvement in my son and the way the therapists treats us is remarkable. Because of lockdown I was apprehensive about the continuity of the therapy of my child. But thanks to the therapists of Asha the Hope, the therapy could be continued.
The foundation also distributed Assistive devices/Callipers for Divyangs suffering from Ankle Foot Orthosis and also provided face-masks for the parents and kids. More than 4800 children with special needs have been benefited by AshaThe Hope Centres set up by JSPL Foundation in Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Odisha. “Asha the Hope” was inaugurated in Dec, 2019 and presently 55 children with special needs from 12 periphery villages of the Jindal Steel and Power Ltd. (JSPL) plant are getting benefit from this Rehabilitation centre.