If Lorillie Soleta, DNP, had created a “Best of” list for 2024, you’d likely find her recent volunteer medical education trip to Ghana, West Africa, on it. It’s where she taught rehabilitation skills and advanced wound treatment to a group of 35 of the country’s nurses who had little or no experience in these specialties last fall.
Lorillie Soleta, DNP (above, center) holds master’s degrees in nursing and education and a doctorate in nursing practice. The Salisbury Township resident has been employed in St. Luke’s Wound Management Center since 2019. (Contributed photo)
For a week in October, Soleta shared didactics and hands-on training at the Kumasi-based Komfo Anoyke Teaching Hospital (KATH). Kumasi is the second largest city in Ghana and lies 90 minutes northwest of Accra, the capital. Ghana, a country of 30 million inhabitants, lies next to the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean.
Many patients in Ghana suffer from pressure sores, amputation-related infections and diabetic wounds, and other skin conditions, as well as nerve-related gastrointestinal and urologic disorders stemming from strokes and traumatic injuries. This economically and medically challenged country lacks the expertise and resources to effectively prevent or address these and many other issues.
Soleta, who lives in Salisbury Township and holds master’s degrees in nursing and education and a doctorate in nursing practice (DNP), has been employed in St. Luke’s Wound Management Center since 2019. Smart, affable and curious, she loves medical learning and, just as much, teaching the knowledge she has acquired over the 25 years she has spent in her profession. Before she started working at St. Luke’s as a wound specialist, she spent 13 years at Good Shepherd Rehabilitation Network as a rehabilitation specialist.
“I’m very thankful to have received good training from Dr. Michael Hortner, wound care specialist and my mentor here at St. Luke’s,” said Soleta, a Philippines native who immigrated to the U.S.
This was Soleta’s second trip to Ghana as an expert-invited speaker for the International Rehabilitation Forum (IRF), a non-profit, Philadelphia-based organization. According to IRF’s website, it is “committed to expanding access to Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation (PM&R), empowering all individuals with physical limitations to unlock their full leadership potential. She made the trip in support of the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Rehabilitation 2030 initiative.
The IRF paid her airfare, and Soleta took vacation time in order to make the trip. St. Luke’s donated free wound dressings and medications she brought along, and the St. Luke’s Simulation Center lent mannequins that Soleto used to teach rehab techniques. Soleta said she is thankful to her supervisor, Lindsey Rich, and Patricio Manzanares, vice president of operations, who collected and sent the medical supplies to the KATH hospital.
Using the tried-and-true nursing teaching process—see one, do one, teach one—Soleta lectured to the nurses using the 12-hour curriculum she created for the course; then gave direct patient care in a clinic setting with the nurses, who first observed, then assisted and took over the treatment.
She learned that, because of the shortage of “modern” medicine, traditional treatments for wounds and other ailments such as ginger and hibiscus are used in Ghana. She explained the benefit of using MediHoney, a sterile gel, in wound healing and was startled to learn that the local version was unfiltered and unsterile but often applied to treat wounds.
“The healthcare providers there do the best they can with the resources they have,” Soleta observed.
Back in the Lehigh Valley, in addition to her clinical activities in the hospital and outpatient clinics, Soleta often speaks on maintaining skin health and providing wound care to students at the School of Nursing, and presents tutorials on these topics in area nursing homes.
She hopes to make future volunteer trips for the IRF to other countries seeking her expertise, possibly in Asia or other parts of Africa, where formal wound care and rehab programs are desperately needed but either nascent or nonexistent.
“I would love to teach this vital knowledge in needy places throughout the world,” said the wife and mother of two adult children.
Chances are, her “to do” lists in future years will include making these goodwill trips, buffered by taking relaxing vacations where she can recharge, including visits to her relatives in the Philippines. It’s a balance she deftly strikes out of a love for teaching, travel and family, as she strives to help make the world a healthier place.
This community health news is brought to you in partnership with St. Luke’s University Health Network.
