Fighting infertility: Spiritual versus clinical antidotes
Human beings have the right to good physical and mental health including the right to reproductive health.
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Unfortunately, infertility sometimes affects the realisation of these human rights.
This is why infertility must be addressed.
Over the ages, infertility has been attributed to both spiritual and medical causative factors.
It has been mentioned in the Bible under various circumstances.
As such, various families afflicted with the condition have sought for spiritual solutions even in addition to medical therapies.
To the people of Larteh in Akuapem for example, the solution for infertility emanates from their renowned Akonedi Shrine headquartered at Larteh-Kubease.
In this article, therefore, I have discussed infertility in general and explore briefly, its clinical and spiritual antidotes in the Ghanaian society.
Infertility
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), infertility is a disease of the male or female reproductive system defined by the failure to achieve a pregnancy after 12 months or more of regular unprotected sexual intercourse.
The WHO further posits that infertility affects about one in every six people of reproductive age worldwide.
Cause
Infertility among males is mostly due to problematic semen ejection, low sperm count or abnormal morphology or movement of sperms.
Female infertility is often caused by a range of abnormalities of the ovaries, uterus, fallopian tubes, and the endocrine system, among others.
In some rare cases, however, it is not possible to clinically explain the causes of infertility.
Perhaps this usually gives the impetus for patients to rather resort to spiritual solutions for the problem.
Infertility can be classified as primary or secondary.
Primary infertility occurs when a woman at a reproductive age has never achieved a pregnancy.
It also means a woman who has never conceived a child in the past has difficulty conceiving.
Contrarily, secondary infertility occurs when the woman had one or more pregnancies in the past, but she is having difficulty conceiving again or unable to carry pregnancy to term.
Blame Game
The causative agent of the primary or secondary infertility can be traced to the male or female partner hence apportioning blame for the cause is not advised since that can pose more psychological pressure.
Clinical Treatment Types
Effective fertility care encompasses the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of infertility.
Unfortunately, infertility treatment can be expensive especially in low-income countries.
Clinically, infertility treatment is highly dependent on the corresponding causative factors and treatment options available and accessible to those affected.
Three main clinical types of infertility treatment can be identified.
These are the use of medications, surgical procedures (e.g., surgical repair of a blocked fallopian tube) and assisted conception including intrauterine insemination (IUI) and in vitro fertilisation (IVF).
IUI involves the placement of washed and concentrated sperm in the woman’s uterus around the time the ovary releases an egg or more to be fertilised.
Contrariwise, IVF involves the removal and sperm fertilisation of the woman’s ovaries in a laboratory after which the fertilised egg (an embryo) is returned to the uterus for growth and development.
Apart from IUI and IVF, infertility can be cured using medications prescribed by a doctor.
It is thus important to seek for clinical fertility care from a recognised hospital or medical practitioner since complications can occur during treatment.
For example, some of the infertility medications tend to have side effects such as nausea, headaches, vomiting and hot flashes.
A hot flash is the sudden feeling of warmth in the upper body, which is usually most intense over the face, neck and chest.
Medical research also revealed that medicines that stimulate the ovaries are not recommended for women with unexplained infertility because they have not been found to increase their chances of getting pregnant.
Infertility and Spirituality
Since infertility is one of the age-long healthcare challenges and sometimes its clinical cause is not diagnosed, various societies have proffered spiritual antidotes to it aside from clinical care.
Accordingly, Kpobi and Swartz (2019) observed that healthcare seeking behaviour in many African countries typically involves making use of multiple healing systems such as indigenous and faith arrangements.
In Ghana, these different healing systems coexisted for many years (Roudsari et al, 2007).
Mindful of the fact that infertility is a multifaceted problem, and it leads to multiple losses, it is expertly advised that health professionals must be tolerant to all aspects of care when caring for infertility patients.
Holistic care considers not only the psychological and social needs of patients, but also their religious and spiritual needs.
For example, women may use their religious/spiritual beliefs to cope with crisis as well as find meaning and hope in their suffering.
Accordingly, Christian women dealing with infertility problems tend to draw inspiration from the Biblical Hannah, the barren wife of Elkanah.
Hannah was childless but God listened to her prayer and cured her infertility (1 Samuel 1:2-2: 21).
Eventually, Hannah became the mother of Samuel in the Bible whose name is given to that chapter of scripture.
Psychologically, Hannah was troubled that Peninnah (Elkanah’s other wife) gave birth, but she (Hannah) was childless.
Genesis 25:21 also states that Isaac prayed to the Lord on behalf of his wife, Rebekah who was childless.
The Lord answered Isaac’s prayer, and Rebekah became pregnant.
Isaac might have sought for spiritual cure for his wife’s infertility because of the belief that children are a heritage and a reward from God (Psalm 127:3).
Other examples of spiritual cure for infertility abound in scripture.
For this and many other reasons, some people afflicted with infertility seek for only spiritual cure or in addition to clinical cure.
Deities and Infertility
Moving from the Biblical examples of spiritual cure for infertility, one may cite other spiritual examples from the Ghanaian society.
For example, it is believed that the Akonedi shrine of Larteh- Kubease offers cure for infertility, using herbs and incantations.
The trite belief is that Akonedi worshippers including barren women or women with countless stillbirth episodes come to the shrine to seek for spiritual antidotes for their conditions (Brokensha, 1966).
Most Ghanaian communities believe in other infertility curing deities.
The people of Mepe in the Volta Region, for example, believe that their deities such as Adido, Dedzi, Aklakpa etc cure infertility and children born pursuant to the cure are given shrine names such as Klu, Klutse, Kosi, Dzatugbe, Xanu among others.
Conclusion
Infertility is inimical to human reproduction.
The WHO defines infertility as a disease and admits that holistic care for infertility considers the psychosocial and spiritual needs of affected persons.
Evidently, therefore, people dealing with infertility in Ghana usually seek for both medical and spiritual cure from clinical and spiritual settings such as hospitals, prayer camps, churches and shrines.
Healthcare providers in Ghana ought to be aware and cope with the patients’ beliefs in spirituality as the cause of their infertility.
The writer is a Hospital Administrator
Email: [email protected]
