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First Regional Center for Reproductive Health Opens in Berane

USAID and its partner CHF recently celebrated the opening of a new Regional Center for Reproductive Health in Berane, located in northern Montenegro. The center was built to replace the Women's Dispensary at the Berane Health Center and provides primary health care services to citizens from four municipalities.

Regional Women's Health Center Director Svetlana Balac describes uses of the first mammography machine in northern Montenegro

Construction, equipping, and furnishing the Center, the first of its kind in this region, cost nearly $500,000 and represents USAID's largest investment to date in Montenegro's health sector. Montenegro's Ministry of Health also contributed to the project, providing training to the Center's care providers. The patient-centered approach of the program, complemented by modern technology, is having an enormous impact on the lives of people in this resource-poor region.

The facility's cutting-edge equipment now includes the first mammography device, 3-D ultrasound, and bone-density scanner in northern Montenegro. To emphasize the importance of preventive medicine in health care, CHF and its partners also launched a multi-faceted public information and education program addressing existing problems related to pre-adolescent and adolescent gynecology, reproductive health and family planning, safe sex practices, and HIV prevention and treatment.

Gynecologist and Director of the Regional Center Svetlana Balac noted that the Center's new equipment enables early diagnosis, monitoring, and quicker treatment. According to her, of the approximately 600 women who have been examined so far, three are suspected of having invasive cancer, eight are in need of surgical interventions, and six will be monitored closely for future health changes.

"These numbers represent human lives," said Balac.

Balac says that the new health center provides equipment, space, and staff necessary to watch over those lives and make a positive difference to the health of women in the region.

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