Towards RCRA Core Program Support

Maternal and Neonatal Health Centre in Rugendabara Kasese, Uganda

Over 150,000 women in Kasese have no access to quality maternal health, children are needlessly dying. Jane is one of these women. RCRA identified that her baby was in the wrong position, but her sub-county has no ultrasound services, and she could not afford or make the journey to the nearest urban town. Without access to this simple piece of technology, Jane was left to suffer a preventable infant death, and lost her life as well during the birth. RCRA is committed to ensuring that stories like Jane’s are not repeated. We want to bring a maternal health centre to the Rugendabara Kasese district to serve these 150,000 women who have no other options. Just one maternal and neonatal clinic that can ensure thousands more children live past 5 years.

RCRA is building a healthier society in the Rwenzori region, one of the highest burden districts in Uganda for maternal and newborn health. One of our key priorities is to ensure that every woman in Rwenzori has access to quality maternal health services. We are already providing integrated outreach day clinics, mobile community nurses, door-to-door home visits and referrals. In 2020, we opened our first adolescent clinic in Rugendabara Kasese. It has already provided 10,764 people with sexual reproductive health services, and 13,232 people with other health care services.

Yet, there is still a need for a maternal health centre in the region. RCRA’s sustainable impact will continue to be limited while we cannot refer women to this kind of centre. We are, therefore, looking to step up to fill this need by building a maternal and neonatal centre to provide comprehensive 28,000 women and 22,000 children annually.

We want to provide comprehensive, compassionate, affordable and accessible high-quality health care to children, adolescents, youth, women and men of all ages regardless of colour, gender, nationality origin, and religious affiliation. We have received all the approvals and accreditations with the Ministry of Health and professional bodies to operate a health centre level III.

The Problem

The Rwenzori region in Uganda faces major public health problems in regard to a high mortality rate of mothers and young children. Much of this is preventable. Kasese District in Uganda is particularly underserved, where many women die of post-partum haemorrhage, hypertension disorders, unsafe abortions and pregnancy-related sepsis.

Kasese has a population of 700,000, of which 500,000 live in rural communities. Currently, there is no specialised maternal and neonatal clinic in the district. Mothers are referred to Fort Portal regional referral hospital a journey of over 80km taking 3 hours only one way. Over 150,000 Kasese women & children with limited or no access to healthcare, family planning & child survival services. Teenage Pregnancy rates remain high at 28% (DHIS2, 2023) among women 10-19 years, only 11.7% pregnant mothers deliver in fully functional comprehensive facilities, and only 34% of women access postnatal care within the first 7 days of delivery.

RCRA is the only organisation working directly on maternal health in Rwenzori’s rural communities. Since 2010, we have been building trust and serving these communities through a range of activities including mobile day clinics, health education and other direct health services. We are having a real impact; for example, our door-to-door outreach services have reduced new adolescent pregnancies by 24% (DHIS2, 2023). However, we cannot refer our patients to clinics that do not exist.

Our Solution

RCRA wants to solve this problem by building and running a maternal health clinic for these communities. With only $557,200 we can build and service RCRA Health Center for the next 3 years delivering state-of-the-art health services to women and children in underserved communities in Kasese district. In the long run, this will enable;

• improved maternal and child health outcomes through specialised care reduces mortality rates, ensuring well-being of vulnerable populations.
• Holistic healthcare addressing community needs: Integrated services improve overall health outcomes and foster community development.
• Promoting Preventive Health Practices: Education programs cultivate a healthier community, reducing disease burden and healthcare costs.
• Provide last mile communities and most vulnerable families with primary health care and nutrition interventions, complemented with community outreach medical mobile day clinics, backpack nurse home appointment, door-to-door home visits health education, health danger identification and client referrals for better health outcome.

RCRA has the vision to end needless maternal and child deaths. But we cannot do this alone. We have the staff and expertise, as well as the requisite approvals. But we need $557,200 to construct the maternal and neonatal clinic. We need to act urgently to prevent mothers and babies from preventable maternal deaths in the rural underserved communities.

• A_CASE_FOR_SUPPORT.pdf (PDF)