Interview with Mary Jude Puerzer, n.d.

Interview Summary

Sister Puerzer had been a nurse midwife in Tanzania 1967-1988 where the official languages spoken were English and Swahili among a total of 125 tribes. Sister Puerzer got to work with 3 of these: one of them in Lukuledi. Until 1977, she was still living out of a suitcase. As a nurse midwife and medical secretary she visited the order's missions, clinics and medical dispensaries. The development of the nurse midwifery service was a matter of getting to know each other. The locals did not share easily any customs or knowledge with the white nurse midwives. They came for the vitamins, aspirin, food and baby supplies. The latter were furnished by the Salvatorian Mission Warehouse through Brother Regis (?) since 1968.

Sister Puerzer taught prenatal classes which, however, were not accepted by the tribal women and provided clinical service. The costs for prenatal care and the delivery were a couple of cents, although the same locals paid many times more for the local witch doctors. She goes on to describe family life and customs. She describes the kind of nutrition-related and obstetrical problems they were facing in Tanzania at the time of independence from England in 1961 and its nationalization starting 1975. The country was not fully ready for nationalization. Tanzanian gross national product was not spent wisely. Other topics covered by Sister Puerzer are: obstetrical procedures used by the international staff, limited anesthetizing at delivery, different belief systems that required a different type of service before and during a delivery, local drugs used for abortion and other customs.

Interview LC Subject

Childbirth Maternal health services Midwifery Midwives Nursing--Study and teaching Puerzer, Mary Jude Puerzer, Mary Jude--Interviews Tanzania

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