Mobile Medicine, Punching Above their Weight, BKB Battles Disease in Rural Villages

Residents of Kamuli Buzimba village wait to see a nurse at Bega Kwa Bega's mobile clinic.

Edward Mugume distributes malaria medication
in Kamuli Buzimba village

          On the veranda and in the front yard of a local church, healthcare professionals triage symptoms, draw blood, discuss concerns, dispense medication and advice. A large canister of malaria medication dominates the pharmacist’s table as he dispenses a package of the curative to every other patient who turns up for care at the quarterly mobile clinic.

          Bega Kwa Bega’s (BKB, Shoulder to Shoulder in English) crew visits, to date, 50 villages per quarter in an effort to make healthcare more accessible to rural areas of central Uganda.

          That they operate in much the same way much larger, world-wide non-governmental organizations do but with a shoe-string of a budget by comparison, is impressive.

Malaria testing kits

Nurse midwife Nora Nakiwolo distributes
anti-worm pills to children in Kamuli Buzimba.

          In these rural locations, healthcare can be 15 or 20 kilometers away from the nearest level four or level three government health facility.

          If their needs are more serious, those level one and two facilities are even more scarce. Access to decent healthcare is a challenge that can turn a curable, nuisance issue into a fatal one.

          The team tests and treats numerous patients for malaria, worms and many other health issues during their  visit. Not surprisingly, numerous patients present with malaria, a parasitic disease that feels much like a flu on steroids. Malaria claims many lives each year, mostly from lack of treatment,  and is among the most common but treatable illnesses in all of Africa.

          In my years of working with such NGOs, I’ve seen many projects and efforts to make a difference. These operations take their work very seriously, doing all they can to run their programs worldwide to reach as many people as possible while preserve the quality of their programs. They are large, multi-national relief and development organizations that often receive millions of dollars in grants to combat disease, poverty, and hunger while giving local populations a leg up in development so that they may eventually sustain their own needs.

Waiting their turn to talk to a healthcare professional.

          As I witness BKB crews carrying out their work, I'm struck by how much their professionalism and effectiveness makes this feel like a major, alphabet-soup -NGO operation.
BKB operations harness the same knowledge and methods, but on a smaller geographic scale, doing all of their work in central Uganda, with far fewer resources.
 Of the 50 mobile clinic stops, four are funded by a grant from Vibrant Village Foundation, the rest are through general fundraising that BKB supporters do in the U.S. and UK.

          I’m not sure how they do it, but it seems Bega Kwa Bega is punching above their weight, battling health issues with resources that somehow stretch to 50 villages.

Be sure to check out other blogs in the Africa series.

Nurse midwife Nora Nakiwolo distributes anti-worm pills to children in Kamuli Buzimba village

Nurse midwife Nora Nakiwolo distributes anti-worm pills to children in Kamuli Buzimba village

Children wait their turn for anti-worm medication.

Edward Mugume distributes medication to patients in Kamuli Buzimba village .

Edward Mugume makes a patient laugh, while distributing  medication to patients in Kamuli Buzimba village

Testing for Malaria

Testing for Malaria. In some African languages, the word malaria means to be sick. As a result, although malaria is so prevalent, people often decide they have malaria when it is some other common, less serious illness.