Kijabe Hospital began as a small clinic in 1913, established to serve the Rift Valley Academy boarding school (where Scott attends) and local community. It was expanded to an in-patient hospital in the 1950s and now serves thousands of patients each year. No one is turned away for lack of money.
It's like no hospital you'll see in the U.S., with its mish-mash of buildings, crowds waiting at the door, patients resting in beds in hallways everywhere, and drying laundry scattered about the campus. The "mish-mash" is why we were here. They've modified and expanded buildings as money became available and a doctor or nurse had a vision for meeting additional needs. The facilities are not well-organized and the board wants to do better.
It was both honoring and humbling to assist the hospital with understanding their facility needs and to help them plan for improvements and expansion. Our team included surveyors, architects, mechanical and electrical engineers, and a couple of us to assess their water and wastewater systems. We were surrounded all week by people, both expat's and East Africans, who have sacrificed more comfortable lifestyles elsewhere to serve the poor. Kijabe Hospital is a great success story and we look forward to providing more details in the next few days.
Paul
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