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Praia de Ondina hosted the last ParaPraia in 2019
Bahiana performs another edition of the project that this year covered more than 300 bathers.
27/02/2019
The 50-year-old sportswoman and swimmer Angélica Moraes has not entered the sea or left her house since she suffered a car accident that left her quadriplegic 8 years ago. Stories like hers marked the 6th edition of the ParaPraia project, an initiative of several institutions with the realization of Escola Bahiana de Medicina e Saúde Pública which aims to provide assisted bathing in the sea for people with disabilities or mobility difficulties.
This summer's edition began on January 5th, at Farol de Itapuã beach and, since then, it has moved through the beaches of Arembepe, Boa Viagem, finishing in Ondina, on February 23rd and 24th. The reason for the tour was due to the fact that Ondina beach, the official location of the project, is undergoing rehabilitation works, completed in the penultimate week of February.
The number of bathers in the project is increasing every year. However, the rate of adherence is also high, as is the case of the 24-year-old Caio Melo, who has Van Der Knaap Syndrome, a rare disease that left him quadriplegic. His mother, Tereza Melo, says that they have participated in ParaPraia since the first edition. "It's a project that moves me, because my son was only able to bathe in the sea because of ParaPraia. I fought from school to leisure projects so that he could have a dignified life, because we are all equal in the differences", he declares she who launched, on February 16, the book "Raro, Não Invisível", in which she tells her story as Caio's mother. "We need society to understand that there are these people, who have feelings, emotions and desires, they need to live life!", says the militant mother.
Every year, the project offers bathers an infrastructure that includes amphibious chairs, access lanes, tents and special buoys, in addition to technical support from health professionals and students from the Bahiana, in addition to community volunteers who are also trained by the institution, before the beginning of each edition.
According to the Dean of Extension of the Bahiana, professor Carolina Pedroza, the institution plays a fundamental role in the realization of the project, as it is the institution that trains, welcomes and takes responsibility for the bathing of each bather served by ParaPraia. "THE Bahiana has an essential role for this project to exist for six years. It is an action of social responsibility and inclusion and, above all, it brings the responsibility of caring for the human being in an ethical and dignified way, providing access to a space that is public, guaranteeing the right to leisure and which is one of the actions promotion of health and that we professionals and students of health in training also understand as a form of care."
Carolina highlights the participation of professors and students from all the institution's courses, especially the Physiotherapy, Physical Education and Nursing courses, and talks about the enrichment that the experience provides. "This action also represents a differentiated space for the student's education, where he has contact with the patient with physical disability or motor limitations, learns the challenges, dilemmas and difficulties, but also learns to take care of this subject who needs to be included in society . It is a care that is technical, professional, but full of love, dedication and responsibility."
For the student of the 7th semester of the Physical Education course, Jordan Azevedo, participating in ParaPraia is a gain for their professional training and also a life experience. He says that, being interested in adapted service, he participated in every day of the action. "For me, it's a sensational experience, especially in my training in Physical Education that we don't see so many professionals engaged in this type of activity. So it's very enriching to be here, because we start to see life with new eyes and see that not everything is just a problem, but challenges that we face."
Challenges 2019
In addition to taking place on different beaches, the project, which this year received around 300 bathers and had approximately 40 volunteers per day, faced other challenges. "We had a record of mechanically ventilated and tracheostomized patients. It was a challenge to put them in water, which inspired us to reinvent ourselves as professionals, led us to learn together with them. Nobody here in Bahia does this, so we are creating this one flow, this routine, providing it to patients who have never been to the sea to take this bath", explains professor Luciana Oliveira, teaching coordinator of ParaPraia and coordinator of the Common Nucleus of Bahiana.
According to the student of the Master's course in Health Technologies at Bahiana, Igor Alonso, who has participated as a trainer since the first edition, when he was still a Physiotherapy undergraduate student at the institution, each year the project demands more and poses new challenges. "I believe that, for 2020, we will arrive with an even bigger structure, with more volunteers, more bathers, I'm really hopeful for next year."
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