To assist in healthcare delivery, Avian Park has been serviced by an informal weekly clinic run by two home-based care workers employed by the Department of Health as well as by medical students from the Stellenbosch University, under supervision of Professor Hoffie Conradie.

The site of the informal clinic is a container that is otherwise used for the administration of directly supervised TB treatment. Referred to as the 'TB container' by the local residents, it was in a dilapidated condition.

To enable Ukwanda to extend its community involvement, expand the medical services delivered and improve the educational experience of undergraduate students, a program of infrastructural improvements needs to be undertaken. These improvements are aimed at the essential maintenance and upgrade of the existing container, which would in turn permit (I) an improvement in service delivery and training and (II) ongoing sustainable healthcare practices and activities.

(I) Improvement in service delivery and training:

• TB and general healthcare training for healthcare workers, including the home-based care givers, who will in turn be encouraged to train others
• Institution of better healthcare systems
• Exposure and training of more local undergraduate medical students, who have already expressed a strong desire to work with underserved rural communities in their future professional careers
• Increased health awareness and preventive medicine activities in the community, with a pediatric focus
• Enlarging and optimizing the platform for tri-partite interaction between the Department of Health, the academic institution (University of Stellenbosch) and the local community (Avian Park)

(II) Practices/Activities:

• Continuation of a weekly clinic run by the two care workers and Stellenbosch University medical students
• Creation of a garden by and for the local community as part of an upgrade and beautification initiative. The garden will also be a valuable food source for the community

CFHI will provide the clinic with medical supplies and vital equipment through our Recover program. The Recover program operates by sending donated medical supplies to underserved communities either via shipping containers and/or through our students, who carry the supplies, as requested by our community partners, with them on their travels to our program sites.

2006 - Present

While this project encountered many challenges and set backs, we tremendously applaud the faculty and students of the University of Stellenbosch for their perseverance.  They have generously taken the time to do the grassroots work of building community involvement and support for the project.  The change was made to scrap the original container that was to be fixed-up and design new containers that could be used as the clinic.  In 2009, the containers were completed and readied for transport to Avian Park. 

Click here to read a blog post by CFHI Executive Director, Steve Schmidbauer, on the success of the Ukwanda Rural Health Program (October 2009).