Jackson woman part of team trying to help save children in Malawi from disease

People know Malawi as the poorest country on Earth and the birthplace of Madonna's adopted son.

Jackson resident Colleen Hammond knows the south-central African nation as one of the countries that's hardest hit by malaria.

The question is: Why does the disease cause some of those children to go into a coma?

Hammond is part of a medical research team from Michigan State University setting up a magnetic resonance imaging machine at a medical facility there to scan the brains of children to try to learn the answer. When it's up and running in June, it will be the only one in the country, and one of seven in Africa.

``The town we are working in is about the size of Michigan Center and very poor. People with money live in houses behind big walls that have glass shards and barbed wire across the top. Foreigners never go out at night,'' said Hammond, chief research technologist at MSU's Department of Radiology and manager of the MRI program there.

Hammond is working with Dr. Terrie Taylor, an MSU professor of internal medicine in the school's osteopathic medicine program, who has established the ongoing study in Malawi. Malaria kills as many as 3 million children annually there.

General Electric Corp. has donated an MRI unit valued at $1.2 million. Hammond visited Malawi for three weeks in July and will return for several weeks in May and again in June for the dedication of the MRI as she helps coordinate the building project.

``Colleen has been a godsend. She is training the technicians at MSU and in Malawi, she is keeping us on track in terms of all of the practical logistics, and she is the `go to' person for a wide variety of questions,'' Taylor wrote in an e-mail from Malawi.

``There were theoretical questions in the beginning, and now that the roof has gone on the building, she's fielding all sorts of technical questions. She's also been a very valuable link to General Electric. I don't know where we'd be,'' Taylor wrote.

Hammond helped train Dr. Samuel Kampondeni, the only radiologist in Malawi, who spent nine months working at MSU's facility. Once the machine is running in Malawi, he will be able to send images to MSU if he needs assistance in reading them.

Hammond became an

X-ray technician in 1987 and worked at Foote Hospital 10 years, then Sparrow Hospital in Lansing for five years. She accepted this position three years ago.

Going to Africa is a bit out of her comfort zone. It takes about three days to get there. She starts taking anti-malaria pills three days before leaving and continues taking them for 10 days after returning home.

The hardest part is leaving her three children: Evan, 14; Kaitlin, 10; and Erin, 8. All three children have gotten involved in their mother's mission.

They are members of St. John Catholic Church, where Hammond is co-chairwoman of Monday night bingo. The money the children earn in tips from selling soft drinks is used to buy coloring books and crayons for the African children.