A sports enthusiast and ardent fan of West Indies cricket, young Ariane Mangar had dreamt of one day running onto the cricket field not as a player but as their physiotherapist. That dream has been fulfilled but today Dr Ariane Mangar has transitioned to become the Director of the Disability and Rehabilitation Services Department of the Ministry of Health and her biggest satisfaction comes from ensuring that the department’s services reach those in the remote areas.
So, whether it is by boat, journeying through trails or climbing hills, Dr Mangar leaves her office in Georgetown and travels with her team to take the services to those who are unable to visit the locations where they are offered. So acquainted are people with her that it is no surprise that a little girl would clap her hands in utter delight when she sees Dr Mangar at her family’s modest door.
With almost 20 years of physiotherapy under her belt, it could be safely said that Dr Mangar is where she belongs as she has committed all of her professional life to assisting people who need therapy and if we are to go by her figures, one third of the country’s population need that service at some point in their lives.
“I have found my niche; I think the universe has aligned for me with this profession…,” was how she described what she does today.
She pointed out that one in every three Guyanese will have the need to access such services, hence the drive of the department to increase human resources and also ensure they are available in all regions. Today there is a therapist in every region except Region Eight, which has helped to raise the quality of services provided.
“We want to be able to meet the people in their communities, [and] improve the services we offer at primary health care for our patients,” Dr Manager said in a recent interview.
In a sit down with this newspaper, she shared that it was while she was awaiting her acceptance letter from the University of the West Indies (UWI) Mona Campus that she received a call from Barbara Lawrence, who then held the portfolio she now holds. Lawrence invited her to spend some time working at the department as a trainee physiotherapist. Following the completion of her studies, she returned to the department working through the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation for some nine years and spending another seven years with the Guyana Defence Force (GDF), before returning to the department as director six years ago.
While her job today is more policy-based, as the department seeks to improve its services and move them forward to keep abreast with changes, Dr Mangar remembers her days of working in the clinics and the satisfaction she received from working with patients and then later seeing “them run and jump and talk…that in itself nobody could give you that sort of satisfaction in seeing that happen in real time with your patient”. She still does outreaches, she said, “walking hills and going in boats to find children” and the satisfaction she gets is just as great.
Services
Mangar explained that the department offers physiotherapy, speech therapy, audiology, occupational therapy, prosthetics and orthotics services. For persons with disabilities, the department mans the Cheshire Home in Mahaica, which houses persons with severe disabilities; and the national vocational centres where young people are trained in vocational skills so that they may become independent. There are also amputee, stroke, spinal cord and other clinics where services are offered at the GPH, the Palms Rehab department and the Ptolemy Reid Rehab Centre. There is also a department at the National Aquatic Centre, which is the sports clinic. Services are also available at the Supply Health Centre and will begin very soon at the Festival City Polyclinic.
The department recently concluded its annual ‘Rehab Week’ observation, which was held under the theme ‘Reflecting, Celebrating and Transforming.’ During the week, they explored how they can move together with the changing landscape of the country to transform rehab centres to meet the people and provide services comparable to what obtains in the rest of the world.
Some of the activities including school screenings where they visited various schools in an attempt to identify children with physical disabilities who need occupational therapy. The idea is to help them with those fine motor skills, such as dressing themselves or combing their hair.
The speech therapist was also available at the screenings as Mangar pointed out that with the restrictions from COVID-19 many children were not interacting with others and so there are different impairments that are showing up, such as speech. They also looked for children with hearing impairment. As their way of giving back, Dr Mangar and her staff also came together and purchased some much needed items for the Archer’s Home. The Stroke Survi-vors’ Association was also officially launched.
Love for sports
Mangar shared that as a child, she played many sports including cricket but she was not particularly good at them. She felt that if she could not run on as a player than she would run on as a physiotherapist.
“That was my dream. I loved sports and I wanted to be the guy who runs onto the cricket field. At that time the West Indies physiotherapist was a guy named Dennis Waithe and as I watched cricket I wanted to be that guy,” she said.
She eventually got the opportunity to work with the West Indies team for a few years, an experience she described as amazing. However, she noted that as one gets older and there is a family involved, life and the source of one’s gratification change.
“You did that, goal accomplished. So now I get gratification seeing the upskilling of the services; the fact that we have more therapists available; gratification in improving the quality of the service that we offer to the public, [is more] …than running onto a cricket field…,” she said, but quickly added that it was fun while she accomplished that particular goal.
Now, Mangar said, she sees a different side of the coin of being a therapist where she can have more of an impact on lives, especially of the ordinary man and that is what “drives me, this is what fuels me, this is why I come to work every day”.
It was while she was working with GDF that she also had some contractual work with the West Indies cricket team, but before that she also worked with the Guyana cricket team and at the world junior games in Jamaica as a young therapist as well as at many Jamaica runs and football games.
“So when the real thing [working with West Indies cricket] came, it wasn’t overwhelming, it was seamless, it was a good experience,” she said. She worked with the President X1 team and then the West Indies women’s team.
Mangar also lectures at the University of Guyana, an experience she cherishes as she enjoys being around people, seeing them blossom and being able to mould them and get them working in the department especially in the regions.
On the completion of her secondary school education, she was awarded a scholarship to attend the School of Physical Therapy in Jamaica/UWI, where she obtained a diploma in physiotherapy. Following that, she completed a Master’s in Sports and Exercise Medicine and later a doctorate in physiotherapy. She also has a post-graduate diploma in disability and other certificates. She said it is important to be involved in continuous learning in the field as it evolves.
While she has found her niche and enjoys what she does, Mangar will not limit herself to remaining in her present portfolio indefinitely, even though it might be a possibility. She is not sure where the universe might lead her next, as other opportunities may open that interest her.
‘Where you camera?’
There is another side to Mangar as she is one of the brains behind the popular gtvibes.com entertainment website, which for years was the website to go to for local entertainment news and photographs of patrons from these events. It started in a time when many people did not have digital cameras or smart phones, but it has had to evolve over the years as most are now able to take their own photographs. For two years, owing to COVID-19 restrictions, there was not much entertainment, so the site became somewhat dormant. Today Mangar shares most of her material on her Instagram page, which has over 40,000 followers.
“I started gtvibes 19 years ago… It was huge. It was there before Instagram and all these things. It was something that I look at it now and I smile…,” she said, adding that she had only done one year of computer science and yet she was able, with the help of two friends, to start up the site at a time when the country only had dial-up internet.
For years, Mangar’s was the face behind the camera and she made stops at many events around the country and then uploaded those photos to the website. People paid for photographs to be on the site, others advertised their events. She was even paid to go to shows.
For her it was her way of having fun more than the financial aspect, adding that it was her “hobby more or less”.
She started out with two friends but both of them migrated and her then boyfriend (now husband) began helping with taking the photographs. She later hired a photographer, but even his life has evolved and she is now looking for another photographer.
Mangar recalled that she had an idea and the three friends sat down and discussed and one of them was more computer savvy so he advised on the uploading of the content, she drew out the website and they built it up. The third friend accompanied her to take the photographs and also helped with that aspect. “When I walked in people used to always say ‘where you camera?’,” Mangar laughed.
