labour of love...

Mothers come long distances to have their babies in Kisiizi... one reason why Hanna is so busy!  Sadly there have been times where, especially at night, women have gone into labour and failed to find transport to come to Kisiizi.  We have had a couple of tragedies where mothers have died prior to arrival here and other times where they have come in at death's door.

overcrowded maternity ward

In addition, we have overcrowding on our maternity ward at times making it well nigh impossible to practice good infection control measures.

The rear aspect gives a pleasant outlook and we plan to plant trees & flowers

The response to this has been to build a Mothers' Waiting Home with support from our friends in Kisiizi Partners and we are delighted to see the building nearing completion.

It will provide comfortable and safe accommodation to allow mothers with known risks to wait here so that when they go into labour they can move  promptly to the maternity ward without any delay.

new beds in a bay in the Mothers' waiting home

Be prepared...

We hope it will never happen... but we are taking pains to prepare for any future outbreak of viral haemorrhagic fever such as Ebola.  We had both Ebola and Marburg within a couple of hours drive from Kisiizi in 2012 and some possible cases but in the end thankfully they all proved negative.  Now of course there are huge problems in west Africa with the Ebola outbreak going out of control and spreading quite rapidly.  Interestingly some specialists from Uganda have been sent to west Africa to try and help arrest the spread of the disease.

Student nurses attending the lecture on Ebola control measures

Hanna has been busy with our Patient Safety Nurse Agnes checking through our supplies of equipment for high level isolation.  We have updated our protocols as best we can in the light of the new interim guidelines issued by WHO on 9th August and Ian and Agnes ran training sessions on Ebola for the Staff and then the Students of the School of Nursing on 12th August to ensure people are aware of actions to minimise the potential spread of such infections should an outbreak occur.

jet setting...

All a bit of a whirlwind as we look back at the past couple of months... not sure how many different beds we slept in but it's well into double figures!

Friends of Kisiizi Day

We arrived back in Macclesfield to find our phone not working, car wouldn't start and then the internet collapsed on us after one day... umm!  But managed to sort things out then off again to Holland for a week to see the family.  Had a lovely welcome, met up with almost everyone including new arrivals, tried to support those facing challenging circumstances.
Worked on a grant application for Kisiizi in conjunction with colleagues from Countess of Chester hospital, Royal Berkshire Hospital and the Uganda Maternity & Newborn Hub links.

interview time..

Then back to UK, met up with friends old and new and then ready for Friends of Kisiizi day in Reading which was a great encouragement as we met with young and old from different parts of UK and Ireland.
 

Straight on the next day to help run the CMF Developing Health course for a fortnight.  Ian has been a director on the course for many years and this year was again a chance to meet wonderful people and get caught up in the enthusiasm to make a difference in healthcare in some of the poorest parts of our world.

We managed to get to France for a couple of nights in Normandy to see Ian's brother Richard and family who run a sheep farm.  First time Ian had diagnosed a hernia in a ewe!

Time flying with phone calls and orders to make for Kisiizi, preached in our church and gave feedback about Kisiizi and then a couple of days helping Ian's mother sort out the house she is selling.

Up bright and early to go to Gatwick with Mark and Ruth and then easyjet to Venice for our 3 night holiday... and in spite of the weather forecasts predicting definite thunderstorms we enjoyed quite good weather and a much needed rest.  We were all tired... Ruth has just completed her first year as a primary school teacher in Islington and will do a Masters in special needs with University of Cambridge next year which follows on from her previous Post-Graduate Certificate of Education course at Homerton College Cambridge.

With Ruth and Mark at our niece's wedding

Mark is writing up the last section of his PhD thesis which is going well.  He is working on a post-doc research programme.  It's something to do with the crystal structure of chocolate!  We don't know any more (and wouldn't understand it anyway) as he signed a confidentiality agreement with the organisation sponsoring the research.

Back to Gatwick, late night drive to Macclesfield, last minute packing then off again to our niece's wedding near Bedford.  It was a wonderful occasion to meet up with the family including Ian's sister Claire from Australia who had come over for the wedding.


Then back to Cheshire late at night for the last day before heading for Manchester airport at 4.30am (thanks Leslie!)

We flew Brussels airlines and it was a smooth trip to Kigali where we had one night before going up to Uganda.  We were warmly welcomed with a meal and speeches and very quickly it felt like we had never been away!

Global impact...

One of the goals of our Management Committee is to raise the profile of Church of Uganda Kisiizi Hospital.  This is partly because it will help us to recruit senior staff.
As Kisiizi is quite rural and isolated, and about 7 hours drive to Kampala, the natural reaction of someone in Kampala being asked to consider working in Kisiizi resembles that of a Londoner asked to go and work in Iceland!  He or she may ask " why ever would I go there - it's a long way away, its cold and they speak a different language!"  
However as we develop our range and quality of services and participate in a range of programmes Kisiizi is becoming more noticed.

Simon & Sam Hardman at Friends Day

One of our elective students from Perth presented his experience and won first prize in the University of Western Australia creating a lot of interest.

Dr. Simon Hardman, who worked in Kisiizi for about 6 months as part of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health Global Links programme shared his experience to the regional paediatric meeting in Leeds and won a prize for best presentation.


In addition to visits from the Prime Minister of Uganda in December 2013 and the Minister of Health of Buganda Kingdom more recently the hospital has also hosted the Archbishop of Uganda who visited in July.

Kisiizi has also featured in a range of publications [these can be found on the hospital website   Click here  ] and most recently an article was published in Contact, the World Council of Churches magasine, which goes out in English and French and reaches 39 different countries.

The photograph on the front page in this edition is one of our Kisiizi Children's ward patients.