Teaching aids at Low Cost

Vision

Teaching-aids at Low Cost was formed by Professor Morley CBE, MD, FRCP when he was lecturer at the Institute of Child Health, London in response to many requests from overseas students for teaching equipment to use in their own countries. His vision was to provide books about health and teaching materials cheaply to healthcare workers and others in low income settings. Originally TALC compiled 35mm slide sets with accompanying notes that clinical teachers could use to illustrate their lectures, showing, for example, what a measles or smallpox rash looks like.

TALC also supplied (and continues to supply) other materials including special spoons for measuring out the correct proportions of sugar and salt to be given to children as life-saving oral rehydration drinks. Good relationships between practising clinicians working both in the South and expatriates working in industrialised nations and in low income settings ensures that supplies are arranged according to need and utility. One simple example of this is the mid upper arm circumference tapes that are used for rapid diagnosis of malnutrition. These are now plasticised to give them longer lives in harsh situations. In the early days much of the work of packing up materials and posting them abroad was done by volunteers based in Saint Albans, Hertfordshire.

Current Work

The charity now has its base in Harpenden, Hertfordshire. With the stampede towards electronic publications and the difficulty of distributing heavy items, many “experts” stated that the days of transporting books to the tropics were long gone. However it is clear that there is still a role for a niche book distributor of practical guides about clinical medicine, health training materials and information on environmental sanitation for use in low income, non-industrialised countries. In addition the photographic slide sets are being reformatted for digital media. Materials deemed by some as outdated including flannelgraphs and laminated charts and posters suitable for illiterate target audiences are still in great demand. TALC continues to distribute these at minimal cost as well as malnutrition tapes and oral rehydration spoons. According to the Chair’s Report of 2015, over the course of its 50 year history TALC has sent over 10 million books, slides and accessories to thousands of healthcare workers in low-income counties and fragile states

Books

Most recently the charity has facilitated the publication of Where There is No Doctor, in the Portuguese language: Onde Não Há Médico, and this is being distributed in Mozambique and other low income countries where Portuguese is spoken. In addition A Community Guide to Environmental Health has also been translated into Portuguese. Such books and other materials are available free, at production cost or for the postal expenses only. The charity has links and handles some titles originating from the Hesperian Health Guides and assists the British Medical Association international department distribute books donated by the BMA. February 2016 saw the launch of a substantial and comprehensive medical textbook Pneumonia in Children. TALC assisted with the tasks of editing and publication of this important work.

Trustees and staff

The charity operates with a minimal number of paid staff and several volunteers who pack and dispatch books and teaching materials but also help on many other levels. The CEO is Madeleine Bates. Trustees are drawn from local business and from experienced clinicians and others who have extensive experience working in low-income settings or in disaster relief. They are

Former valued trustees and advisers include Professor Sandy Cairncross OBE, Grazyna Bonati, Lois Carter, David Abernethy and John Burnell.