Bwindi community hospital is situated in the northern part of Bwindi’s impenetrable forest park in the Buhoma sector within the southwestern part of Uganda. The hospital began with only one doctor sitting under a tree and offering free health services, this hospital was founded in 2003 by Scot and Carol Kellermann. It was upgraded into a hospital within the year 2008 once they built another operating room.
The hospital first began with a mission to assist the Batwa pygmy people that were displaced from Bwindi’s impenetrable forest park that had been their home for many years, after a short time the hospital found itself treating people from everywhere in the world and even beyond.
Bwindi community hospital – Batwa (pygmy) Support
The Bwindi community hospital has greatly improved in recent years becoming a 112-bed hospital serving over 100,000 people therefore the hospital has been considered together of the simplest within the Sub-Saharan region. The hospital has been rated the simplest performing hospital in Uganda by the Uganda protestant Medical Bureau.
The church is an Anglican Church under Kiinkizidiocese staffed by over 100 workers with 70% being from the world around the hospital and 30% from other parts of the country. The hospital laboratory has been ranked because the best in southwestern Uganda by Star Southwest, an NGO fighting HIV in southwestern Uganda.
The sustainability of all times gardens at the hospital provides patients and staff with food while training communities on nutrition, sanitation, and sustainable agriculture. Bwindi community hospital was also acknowledged in 2013 by public opinion in Uganda for its contribution towards the attainment of Millennium development goals.
Accessibility to Bwindi community hospital for all is the most vital part of their mission with a belief that each one people have equal rights to access health care. The hospital sends different teams to surrounding villages seven days every week, they also opened a satellite during a Batwa settlement called Byumba.
Cases of malaria dropped from 23.2% in 2006, to 13.5% in 2011, OPD attendance has also grown by 85% in 3 years.
2018 won an award from UPMB for leading in innovation and use of technology in nursing education in Uganda.
2018 won an award from UPBM for innovatively growing the Community Health Insurance, the overall best performer in timely compilation and submission of quality reports and good Monitoring and evaluation practices.
A number of other health facilities from across the country continue coming to learn from Bwindi about innovations and best practices to help improve the care in their region.
For the last ten years, Bwindi community hospital has been ranked among the best-performing health facilities in Uganda according to the Uganda Protestant Medical Bureau.
