slwtwist

This short documentary details the lives of palliative care workers in Uganda. These nurses and health care workers do amazing work with very few resources. Their patients are often located miles away from roads, many of which are barely passable. The caregivers provide not only health care and pain relief but do so in a manner that enhances the patient's dignity and humanity.

It amazes me the amount of comfort and care that can be conveyed without resorting to high-tech machinery and diagnostics. I think the American medical community could learn a lot from spending time with these health care workers.

Caring for a dying parent has to be one of most heart-wrenching jobs in the world. Yet the three children/young adults featured this documentary, along with others who stories are also told, persevere. They remain hopeful that there will be people to care for them and about them.

These are heartwarming stories, yet are told without sentimentality. There's no glossing over the tough parts of life and death in this film. However, the overriding message is that hope can - and does - exist, despite extreme poverty. And that there are caring people in the world. The our news feeds on social media may be filled with doom and destruction. But documentaries such as this reveal caring in the most unlikely places.