Tag Archives: Doctors

Dr. Rhoda attends to a patient as the mother looks on

School of Medicine pediatrician: ‘I felt I had found my place’

Faculty, News, UCU School of Medicine, , , , ,


 

Dr. Rhoda attends to a patient as the mother looks on
Dr. Rhoda attends to a patient as the mother looks on

By Eriah Lule
From 6am to 6pm, one can’t fail to notice Dr. Nakiriba Rhoda Mayega within the in-patient Paediatric Wing (children’s ward) at Mengo Hospital, a private, faith-based teaching facility in Kampala, Uganda. 

As many embraced medicine as a career, for Mayega it was more. She holds it as a deeper calling with the passion to both heal the sick and to pass on her 10 years of medicine experience as a lecturer within the Uganda Christian University (UCU) School of Medicine (SoM). During her 12-hour days, five days a week, she can be seen with patients and SoM students at what many call Namirembe Hospital, which was founded by Sir Albert Ruskin Cook, a British medical missionary in Uganda. 

Growing up as a young girl, Mayega excelled in science, leaving her at a crossroads of being either an engineer or a doctor.  The late Richard Wabwire, her former sciences teacher at Trinity College Nabbingo, an all-girls boarding school, counseled her to lean further toward medicine. 

Having finished her Bachelor in Medicine and Bachelor in Surgery at Makerere University, she did an internship at Mulago National Referral Hospital in 2009. As a trainee doctor in an emergency ward handling many fragile cases, her love for adult medicine was ignited.

Dr. Rhoda supervises UCU medical students in the ward.
Dr. Rhoda supervises UCU medical students in the ward.

“For adults, diagnosis was easy, but in the Paediatric Ward, cases needed thinking fast and hard as most of them were a life-and-death situation,” she said “I didn’t like the Paediatrics Wing at all.”

Later in 2010 after her internship she applied in a private clinic within the former Louis Medical Centre in Kampala. It was a job that excited her while causing some dismay because she saw a major gap of services in the Paediatric ward. 

“After three months of working, I felt the environment wasn’t stimulating,” Mayega recalled.  “I felt underutilized.”

She took her credentials to Kayunga District Hospital in the central part of the country. There were two medical doctors on staff with one being the medical superintendent and another, Dr. Sabiiti Perezi, engaged in administrative tasks more than patient care.  

No sooner had she started her conversation with the hospital’s Human Resources, than an emergency happened in the labor ward; an operation had to be done to save a mother and child.

“First head to the ward and save them, then we can talk later, HR told me,“ she remembered. “I carried out a successful Caesarean section. In me, I felt I had found my place.”

With such tidings and talent, the District Service Commission (committee in charge of hiring civil servants at Local Government level across all sectors/departments) held an emergency meeting and agreed that Mayega should join the Hospital. In 2010, she was confirmed into Government service.

According to the Analysis of Health Labour Market in Uganda report 2022, the total stock of health workers in Uganda was estimated at 158,932 in 2022 with a density of 25.9 doctors, nurses and midwives per 10,000 people. The highest number of health workers were nurses and midwives (106,915), followed by laboratory technicians (16,098) and clinical officers (13,627).

With such statistics and few skilled medical doctors at the time, Kayunga Hospital had no doctor attached to obstetrics and paediatrics, leaving Mayega no option but to join the ward and serve.

The smiles from children after a relief of their medical challenges, along with the prayers and thank yous from their parents, was the beam of hope that further cemented Mayega’s service in paediatrics.

Dr. Rhoda, at right, attends to a patient.
Dr. Rhoda, at right, attends to a patient.

“A child’s smile and a relieved parent spoke directly to my soul,” she said. “This is what I am going to do for the rest of my life.”

Mayega credits her supervisor, Dr. Edson Mworozi, a senior consultant paediatrician from Mulago who visited Kayunga every two months, for much of her success.  He told the Medical Superintendent not to “let the young lady go… her talent is a living testimony for the people of Kayunga.”

“I was in paediatrics but we still collectively managed emergencies as the three doctors,” she recalled. 

In 2013 and despite insufficient human resources at the hospital, the District Service Commission granted her a study leave, allowing Mayega to leave Kayunga to pursue her Masters of Paediatrics and Child Health at Makerere University for three years.

In 2016, she worked part-time at Mengo’s Paediatric Ward while serving at Kayunga.

The District Health officer of Kayunga District at the time retired, and the Hospital Medical Superintendent was appointed to the position. Dr. Sabiiti, who was more senior, had advanced in age so he couldn’t replace the Superintendent; Mayega was called to fill the position to steer the hospital leadership, an opportunity she turned down.

“I wasn’t going back to Kayunga,” she said. Being married with children was part of the reason.

Mengo Hospital wrote to the Government asking Mayega to join there. She first served as a visiting paediatrician at the out-patient ward later transferred to the in-charge of the Paediatrics Ward to today.

Before joining, the hospital Paediatric Ward was referred to as a “death bed” as it was difficult to go a day without multiple mourning for the loss of  children. When Mayega joined, the mortality rate dropped.

“The department was well known for not generating any income for the hospital,” Mayega said.  “It is now recognised for its tremendous efforts.”

UCU journey
When the UCU SoM started in 2018, Dr. Edward Kanyesigye (the first Dean) sought to leverage on the experts of the hospital to champion a holistic education for the students –  a goal he achieved. Mayega was among the experts who invented her own style of passing knowledge. She highlighted the course’s rich communal transformation in a unit called Maternal and Child Health, which requires students to go into communities and learn about a child.

In one of his engagements, the UCU Vice Chancellor Prof. Aaron Mushengyezi, highlighted the need of academic staff to advance their careers by pursuing PhDs that would help them to get grounded in research, partnerships and grants.

This statement is an affirmation of Mayega’s aspirations.

“I want to advance for my PhD to get grounded in the area of research to add onto the literature around Paediatrics in the country,” she said.

Her continuous encouragement and influence for further studies has led two of her subordinates at the hospital to pursue their Masters in Paediatrics. After them succeeding, she could have time to focus on research and hospital supervision.

Background
Mayega is married to Dr. Roy William Mayega, a medical doctor and a senior lecturer at Makerere University School of Public Health. The couple, married for 15 years, has four children.

Mayega is the last born of four children of the late Mr. and Mrs. John Baptist Buyisi. 

Mengo is the first hospital in Uganda, established by a missionary and physician Dr. Sir. Albert Cook with his wife who belonged to the Church Missionary Society in 1897; Mengo is owned by the Anglican Church.  

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Uganda Christian University has many stories like this one. To support programs, students, activities, and services, go to  www.ugandapartners.org and click on the “donate” button, or contact UCU Partners Executive Director, Mark Bartels, at  m.t.bartels@ugandapartners.org.

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Linda Obukor Ojore, year-three Uganda Christian University School of Medicine student, arrives outside Nassolo Ward, Mengo Hospital, Kampala, Uganda, at 7:30 a.m.

UCU medical student Linda Obukor Ojore shares slice of life

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Linda Obukor Ojore, year-three Uganda Christian University School of Medicine student, arrives outside Nassolo Ward, Mengo Hospital, Kampala, Uganda, at 7:30 a.m.
Linda Obukor Ojore, year-three Uganda Christian University School of Medicine student, arrives outside Nassolo Ward, Mengo Hospital, Kampala, Uganda, at 7:30 a.m.

(What’s an average day like for a UCU medical school student?  This two-part story is designed to provide some insight.  Today is focused on one year-three student.)

By Patty Huston-Holm
It’s Monday morning in the 35-bed Nassolo Ward at Mengo Hospital on Cathedral Hill Road, Kampala, Uganda.  

At 8 a.m. Linda Obukor Ojore, 22, talks to a woman slightly older. Writing carefully in block letters, Linda, wearing a white coat emblazoned with her name and the Uganda Christian University (UCU) logo, records answers to questions about the woman’s sick child who nearby sleeps with a breathing tube through his nostrils and saline solution entering his body intravenously through his wrist. 

“His third admission,” Linda writes about the boy, aged four-and-a-half years. In blue ink, she documents that the child recently has been to other hospitals with symptoms of vomiting and convulsions and one diagnosis of malaria that does not appear to be a reason for any illness now.  

“He has no ‘hx’ (history) of chronic illness, no asthma or epilepsy,” she writes as the mother speaks in English and the father, silent, stands nearby, and as both parents show a phone video of the boy walking days earlier. Linda speaks English and Acholi dialect, but only English here. 

“No drug or food allergies,”  the mother says, and Linda writes.

Year-three UCU School of Medicine student, Linda Obukor Ojore, left, shares a light moment with Dr. Rhoda Mayega at Mengo Hospital during a 12:30 p.m. break from a lecture class facilitated by the doctor.
Year-three UCU School of Medicine student, Linda Obukor Ojore, left, shares a light moment with Dr. Rhoda Mayega at Mengo Hospital during a 12:30 p.m. break from a lecture class facilitated by the doctor.

On this day, 18 beds in Nassolo Ward are filled with children intermittently crying and being entertained with cartoons and happy-and-you-know-it and Jesus-loves-me songs from parent phone screens. Most days, the 35 beds above a tending parent who sleeps and prepares food on the floor are not enough, according to Dr. Rhoda Mayega, a doctor for 15 years and now also mentoring UCU School of Medicine students in their third, as with Linda, and the final, fifth year of studies. 

“We have one nurse for all of these,” Dr. Mayega said. “In the section with babies under 28 days, we also have only one nurse.”

From her office near where Linda documents a year-three course-required case study, Dr. Mayega described equipment health care deficiencies including heart/blood pressure monitors, syringe pumps, throat scopes, CPAP (continuous positive airway pressure) breathing machines and X-ray, radiology diagnostic equipment. 

“We have no ventilators,” she said. “Even mattresses and clean sheets are scarce.”

Next to where Linda recorded a male child’s condition, a father held his sick baby girl as a worker sanitized and flipped the child’s mattress, soothing clean sheets and a pillowcase for her return with a blanket the daddy brought. Above the beds were the words “Let the little children come to me.”

Linda continued writing.

“He has minimally improved … prior to discharge,” she penned. This referenced the boy’s condition before referral to Mengo Hospital. This is one of Linda’s course-required case studies. The parents know she’s a student and approve. 

Placing her stethoscope in a large pocket of her jacket, Linda thanked the parents

Linda Obukor Ojore, right, during a morning critiquing session of her patient assessment. Classmate Wanyenze Angelina is at left.
Linda Obukor Ojore, right, during a morning critiquing session of her patient assessment. Classmate Wanyenze Angelina is at left.

and walked into a nurses’ office, where she further transcribed her notes – this time in red ink – that she would use when giving her oral report before a doctor and her classmates.  

Thirty minutes later, huddled within earshot of the parents and still-sleeping child, as well as her classmates who stood in a half circle and near a water bottle filled with disinfectant, Linda spoke, seriously and appreciatively, accepting corrections to her report from Dr. Joseph Ssali.

At one point, he asked her to describe a convulsion, casually referenced as “fits,” in more medical terms. In another part of a 45-minute session, Dr. Ssali asked students to define hypoglycemia, a low-blood sugar condition with shaking and dizziness among symptoms. 

“All of us have to have two cases right now,” Linda explained when leaving the ward for a lecture. “What I did this morning is what I need to do with one more patient. We learn from the doctors, from each other and even the patients.” 

Most of the doctors at Mengo, including the UCU School of Medicine dean, Dr. Gerald Tumusiime, were trained through Makerere University, which has had a medical school for 100 years, compared to the six years since the five-year program was launched at UCU.  The UCU School of Medicine collaborates with Mengo, a private, non-profit local referral hospital.  Makerere gives its medical students hands-on experience with Mulago Hospital, which, as a national referral institution, has more specialized medicine in such areas as neurology and cardiology. The two hospitals are 4.9 kilometers (3 miles) apart. 

Some patient notes from Linda Obukor Ojore
Some patient notes from Linda Obukor Ojore

UCU is the newest medical school in Uganda.  It was launched in 2018 with nearly 100 current alumni in a country with one doctor per 25,000  people.  The World Health Organization recommends one doctor per 1,000 people.

Linda, who was born near Mbale and attended primary and secondary school in Kampala, wants to be among UCU’s July 2027 class with a Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery degree. Linda and more than 40 classmates are half-way to that goal, which is followed by Uganda’s one-year, required internship. 

“I can’t remember not ever wanting to be a doctor,” she said. 

When walking across the street from the children’s ward and passing a vendor selling juice and blankets, Linda reflected that her “desire to help people” may have started when her younger brother had congenital heart failure. He had to be flown for surgery in Germany because it wasn’t performed in Uganda. 

At 10:30 a.m. in a small room near the UCU School of Dentistry laboratories, Linda and two dozen classmates prepare to share definition, frequency, symptom and cause information and answer Dr. Mayega’s questions about two unhealthy bodily functions – vomiting and diarrhea. Two classmates provide discussion points via a WhatsApp PDF that all students view from their phones or laptop device screens. 

“What is the difference between acute and chronic?” Dr. Mayega asked. “What might be symptoms of an electrolyte imbalance? What might be the cause of blood in the stool? How can you determine dehydration without equipment?”

The definition of acute is symptoms less than two weeks; chronic is more than two weeks. Confusion, dizziness, skin color may indicate an imbalance of minerals or electrolytes. Blood in feces could indicate E.coli or salmonella. Without a watch, the medical professional can check the hydration-related responsiveness of color returning to skin with a three-second count. 

“Mango one, mango two, mango three,” Dr. Mayega said as students squeeze a finger with the opposite hand to determine color response in three seconds. 

“This is harder than I expected,” Linda said. “But being able to relate what is in the classroom to patients is rewarding.”

At 12:30 p.m. and before dashing to a canteen for a snack or lunch prior to afternoon studies, Linda, who has her current sights on pediatric medicine,  added that time with doctors and the Christian-based emphasis at the hospital and university is likewise a positive with getting her degree from UCU. In addition to the financial challenges that most students face, one barrier has been seeing people die. 

“I watched four people die – three adults and one child,” she said.  “I had to realize that doctors can’t save everybody, and that dying is part of life. I will do what I can.”

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Uganda Christian University has many student stories like this one.  To support  programs, students, activities and services, go to  www.ugandapartners.org  and click on the “donate” button, or contact UCU Partners Executive Director, Mark Bartels, at  m.t.bartels@ugandapartners.org.

Also, follow us on X (formerly Twitter), Instagram and Facebook.

Beatrice Birungi at UCU School of Medicine (UCU Partners photo)

Student Profile: Ebola was dose of inspiration

UCU School of Medicine, , , , , ,
Beatrice Birungi at UCU School of Medicine (UCU Partners photo)
Beatrice Birungi at UCU School of Medicine (UCU Partners photo)

(NOTE: In September 2018, Uganda Christian University launched a School of Medicine with 60 students. To “put a face” on Uganda’s future doctors and dentists, some of these students were interviewed at the completion of the first semester. This is a story about one of these students.)

By Frank Obonyo
As I sat down to write her story, one thing became clear. Beatrice Birungi’s aspirations are comparable to those of Dr. Bernard Rieux in the novel, The Plague.

In his fictional account, Rieux was one of the first people to urge the public to take stringent measures to fight the deadly epidemic that struck the French Algerian City of Oran. When it is placed under quarantine, Dr. Rieux continues to battle the plague despite signs that his efforts make little or no difference. Although he is separated from his wife, he does not allow his personal distress to distract him from his battle to relieve the collective social suffering.

Just like Oran City, Beatrice’s village Bumate in Bundibugyo District Western Uganda was swept by an Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) epidemic in 2010 when she was just eight. Four of her relatives died because of the deadly virus, and the surviving ones were not allowed to take part in the burial ceremonies. In any African tradition, telling one that they cannot bury their loved ones can be tormenting.

As a little child, she saw her surviving relatives quarantined by the government to reduce any further spread of the virus. Ebola spreads through direct contact with infected bodily fluids—and the disease can cause people to excrete blood and other bodily fluids as they die. Thus, the precaution of the quarantine occurred.

Beatrice then made up her mind to study and become a medical doctor in order to raise awareness about Ebola prevention and treatment with the hope of saving her community. She is one of the pioneers of the Uganda Christian University (UCU) School of Medicine.

“I want to become a doctor so that I can help my people should that kind of epidemic strike again,” Beatrice said. “I felt that there was much more that would have been done such as educating health workers on better understanding of the disease and strengthening clinical care.”

Time and time again, it has been necessary for Beatrice to have a strong will and determination. She has never been the type of student who looked down on herself. She has a heart to help the community and believes that an African girl deserves to achieve much even amidst all odds.

Medical Laboratory head, the Rev. Bernard Simeon Bakunda, demonstrates the Estimation of Haemoglobin by Sahli's Technique to student Beatrice Birungi. (UCU Partners photo)
Medical Laboratory head, the Rev. Bernard Simeon Bakunda, demonstrates the Estimation of Haemoglobin by Sahli’s Technique to student Beatrice Birungi. (UCU Partners photo)

“Girls should not be put in this little picture of a small person who is only supposed to be beautiful and speak nicely,” she said. “They also can become doctors.”

She chose UCU’s School of Medicine because she was told by her dad and three other siblings who studied at UCU that she would receive a holistic education – one that addresses the hands, head and heart.

“We have a tight schedule at the School of Medicine but it is all about setting priorities right,” she said. “Our school is new, but there is a bright future for it. I love the small class because it enables us to interact with lecturers so freely, and we hope to get more and better equipment which will be used to train us into better medics.”

Beatrice also is a writer. She started working on a fictional story in 2017 and believes she will be a published author within the next two years.

Against equal opportunity challenges common to most African girls, Beatrice decided she would not allow negative people to keep her from achieving her goals. She has hope and a “no-give-up” spirit.

“I am proud to say that I have always been determined to pass and graduate as a medical doctor even though my society often believes that the girl child is only good for marriage,” she said.

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More information about the Uganda Christian University School of Medicine can be obtained at https://www.ugandapartners.org/priority-projects To support science students, books and facilities at the medical school, contact Mark Bartels, executive director, UCU Partners, atm.t.bartels@ugandapartners.org or donate directly at: https://www.ugandapartners.org/donate/

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“I was sick and you visited me…truly I tell you whatever you did for the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.” – Matthew 25:36-40

UCU Launches School of Medicine with foresight, planning, prayer

UCU School of Medicine, , , , ,


By Patty Huston-Holm

“I was sick and you visited me…truly I tell you whatever you did for the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.” – Matthew 25:36-40
“I was sick and you visited me…truly I tell you whatever you did for the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.” – Matthew 25:36-40

This, according to Dr. Ned Kanyesigye, sums up not only the reason that Uganda Christian University (UCU) started a medical school, but also what makes UCU unique in doing it.

That Uganda needs more doctors is without question. The World Health Organization reports 1 doctor per 13,000 Ugandans compared to the 1 per 400 citizens in the United States. To churn out these doctors, Uganda needs more medical schools.  What gives UCU an edge in producing medical practitioners is not only institutional oversight for knowledge and skill, but also the moral and ethical ties to Christianity.

“We know the need,” said Dr. Ned, Dean of the UCU School of Medicine (SoM). “But we’re about quality and not quantity. Our country’s infant mortality rate is high and our life expectancy is low.”

The first 60 students – 50 in medicine and 10 in dentistry and more than half female – started classes in the UCU School of Medicine in early September of 2018 with hopes to graduate in 2022. The selection process was painstaking as five credentialed professionals wove through 500 applicants with impeccable high school transcripts. That number was reduced to 150 who were scrutinized for reading habits, writing and overall communication ability, science expertise, faith, and knowledge of current affairs.

Criteria without wealth consideration
“Whether they had money was low on the criteria,” said Edward Kanyesigye, who is known as Dr. Ned. “I was poor and overcame it.  But clearly they must pay fees or be forced to drop out. ”

The first class of 60 includes bright, energetic young people from all parts of Uganda with a few from African countries of Eritrea, Nigeria, South Sudan, Kenya and Tanzania. They study and live within a hospital complex in Mengo, a hillside community 1.5 miles from the heart of Uganda’s capital city of Kampala and near an archway leading to the King of Buganda palace. They learn from lecturers and books and through practicums at the Mengo hospital.

“We got them exposed to cadavers right away,” Dr. Ned commented. “We prepared them in advance, and all were engaged.”

“Who got the idea for a medical school?” Dr. Ned pondered the question out loud.  In the midst of the planning and a year before the opening, he sat behind his office desk in the UCU Mukono campus Academic Building. “I can’t say it was me. There was collective thought. The Province of the Church of Uganda was talking about it for years. Based on successful health-related programs here at UCU, it was a natural progression.”

In July of 2014, a team of UCU faculty and other Province of Church of Uganda stakeholders (including Mengo Hospital management) met to discuss medical service gaps in Uganda. Seated around a table at Silver Springs Hotel near Kampala, around 30 people looked at data verifying the need beyond Uganda’s already existing 10 medical schools, discussed what a quality health professionals training might look like and examined possible facility and personnel requirements.

Instrumental to the startup was Dr. Miriam Gesa Mutabazi, a senior medical doctor (obstetrician gynecologist by training) and now executive director of the Save the Mothers program at UCU. She assisted with the new school on a consultancy basis to coordinate the day-to-day process of “growing the medical school project.” She was influential in putting together the curriculum and convening meetings of the medical school’s working group on the project.

Adding dentistry and medicine was a natural outgrowth of UCU health-related programs that evolved in the institution’s 21-year history.  In the months before the UCU School of Medicine official launch on September 14, 2018, the UCU Department of Health Sciences became the School of Medicine, folding in the already existing programs of nursing, public health, and Save the Mothers health administration with the new medicine and dentistry tracks.

“Nobody said ‘medical school’ right away,” Dr. Ned. “But most of us, including the Vice Chancellor (Rev. Canon Dr. John Senyonyi), knew that was why we were there at that meeting four years ago.  In the end, it was unanimous.”

Dr. Ned, center, with some of the first students for the new medical school
Dr. Ned, center, with some of the first students for the new medical school

UCU-Mengo Hospital collaborative
The Mengo Hospital and UCU collaboration was a given with UCU’s quality standing among East African universities, UCU’s nearby Kampala campus and Mengo’s reputation as Uganda’s oldest hospital and its modernization in the 121 years since its inception. In addition to acknowledging the need, both partners already had shared values of ethics, holistic practices, compassion and “witness of Jesus Christ.” A medical school supports the UCU strategic plan to increase science programs and its design to enhance evidenced-based practice and research. The programing also aligns with the Uganda’s goal to expand science-related careers.

As with any new project, there were bumps in the road, Dr. Ned recalled. The start date was later than the original plan due to the approval process of the National Council of Higher Education. Under God’s plan that “in all things God works for the good of those of love Him, who have been called according to His purpose (Romans 8:28),” however, Dr. Ned pointed out that the delay translated into a higher quality program. The added time allowed more study about staffing, facilities, curriculum, student applications, tuition, governance and overall design.

Data-driven initiative
Data was a main driver.  More than half of Uganda’s citizens have no access to public health facilities, and 62% of health care posts are unfilled. Women and their babies are dying during the birth process. Respiratory and blood pressure issues are increasing alongside HIV/AIDs, tuberculosis, malaria and diabetes.

In addition to foundational programs required of all UCU students and renovated space, the start of the program includes:

  • Anatomy, Physiology and Biochemistry curriculum guided by full-time lecturers and part-time teachers;
  • Old Testament Bible Study;
  • Clinical specialists (pediatrics, medicine, surgery, gynecology); and
  • Hands-on skill training to compliment video, textbook and lecture content.

Subsequent years could enable allowing some students to opt out of courses based on their high qualifications, including experience; conducting internships and practicums at various locations; and attaining degrees beyond the initial two (medicine, dentistry) to those in pharmacy, biomedical laboratory science and nursing science.

“We continue to be besieged by calls and emails from potential students wanting in,” Dr. Ned said. “Medicine is a highly competitive field. We want applicants who are ready to apply social responsibility, empathy, integrity, individual and team skills and problem solving and to engage in lifelong learning.”

Among outcomes required for the UCU School of Medicine graduates is wellness. They need to practice and teach disease prevention and cure and describe and prescribe for illnesses and injuries.

Need for student sponsorship
That the first class of UCU School of Medicine is up to the tasks is without question. The biggest hurdle is money for staffing, equipment and students.  Tuition is $4,100 a year (includes room and board) for each of the five years. Sponsors are needed. In addition to full support:

  • Every gift of $150 will provide library materials for one student.
  • 25 donors giving $50/month will buy the physiology simulator.
  • $500 scholarships will help offset the costs for students since most Ugandans live on $2 per day.
  • 4 donors giving $2,500 will help the School obtain the anatomy software needed this year.

“While we spent time in both prayer and study for this to happen, clearly we need support,” the dean said.

For Dr. Ned, this new venture is just one of many in his career that has taken him throughout Uganda and in various medical-related leader and teacher positions that include practicum related to patient care, tobacco control and the fight against HIV/AIDS, among others. He is finding the possibilities exciting not because of any personal legacy but because of ability impact positive change.

“We are in the business of mankind so wherever the need is, we hope we can help meet it,” he said.

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More information about the Uganda Christian University School of Medicine can be obtained at https://www.ugandapartners.org/priority-projects or http://ucu.ac.ug/component/k2/item/25-ucu-to-launch-her-medical-school.

Support from the United States can be addressed to Mark Bartels, executive director, UCU Partners, at m.t.bartels@ugandapartners.org or https://www.ugandapartners.org/donate/ To support the UCU School of Medicine from Uganda, send mobile money on 0772 770852 (Uganda Christian University) or email development@ucu.ac.ug.

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Patty Huston-Holm of Ohio in the USA is a visiting UCU faculty member, working on various writing projects and serving as the volunteer communications director with the UCU Partners NGO that is based in Pennsylvania, United States.