HMI partnership with new hospital hopes to strengthen Zimbabwe health care system

Dr. Daud Dube, deputy chairman of Zimbabwe Health Care Trust.

A team from HMI visited Zimbabwe this spring to see the completion of a new, modern hospital facility in Bulawayo, one of the first fruits of a partnership between HMI and the Zimbabwe Heath Care Trust (ZHCT).

Long-awaited, the new facility—Ekusileni Medical Center (EMC)—is a private, 160-bed hospital. It will be a teaching site of the public medical school, also located in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe’s second largest city, approximately three hundred miles southwest of the nation’s capital, Harare.

Dr. Daud Dube, dean of the University of Zimbabwe, School of Health Sciences at Bulawayo and deputy chairman of ZHCT, who describes the new facility as “glorious,” is optimistic. “We believe the programs, policies, systems and equipment that our alliance with HMI will help create will make us a center for excellence that will attract the kinds of people and specialties that are now not readily available in Zimbabwe.”

Addressing challenges
A country of 12 million, Zimbabwe faces all the health care challenges of the modern world, intensified by widespread poverty and a rapidly growing AIDS epidemic. In addition, Zimbabwe has suffered the loss of many of its most seasoned and well-trained physicians, who have fled the country in search of personal and economic opportunities elsewhere. “This flight of health care talent leaves medical schools and centers without the mentors to create a new generation of specialists,” said Elizabeth Brown, HMI director of clinical services. And the problem does not just affect physicians, she added. “Nurses, too are looking for career development opportunities and better working conditions, as growing nursing shortages impact patient care and staff morale.”

But the future is looking more promising. “We were elated to see that the new hospital was standing and getting ready for occupancy. A brand new modern facility—what a beautiful sight,” said Dr. Andrew Jeon, HMI executive vice president and chief operating officer, who played a major role in forging the HMI/ZHCT alliance and led the four-person HMI team on their recent visit.

From left to right: Dr. Harvey Makadon, Dr. Andrew Jeon, Dr. Daud Dube, and Albert Gillis discuss plans for the new hospital

The team— Jeon; Brown; Dr. Harvey Makadon, HMI director of health systems; and Albert Gillis, HMI director of health care facilities development —spent four days learning about current activities and planning future directions for the new medical center. Their major goals for the visit included touring the new facility and judging its readiness to open, meeting with the medical and administrative staff to determine their needs and recommendations for the new medical center, and taking the first steps toward developing a regional resource for HIV/AIDS education and treatment in southern Zimbabwe.

A new model of care
The hope of the HMI team and their Zimbabwe counterparts is that the patient care and professional training that will be delivered at the Ekusileni Medical Center will be a model and a catalyst for a revitalized health care system throughout the country.

Zimbabwe has a history and tradition of excellent medical education and patient care, a tradition that has been compromised recently by politics, economics and the exodus of health care providers, according to Makadon. “We want to entice highly trained professionals to stay in or return to their country and care for the people of Zimbabwe,” he said.

According to Jeon, the overriding mission of the alliance, therefore, is to help build an infrastructure that will support EMC in meeting international standards for health care quality and medical education.

Creating a medical center attractive to the best and the brightest will require innovative programs, leading-edge medical technology, career development opportunities, access to the latest information technology, and quality management tools. All are top priorities for HMI and its partner over the next year.

Looking ahead
While on their visit, the HMI team took some initial steps to meet with community leaders in Bulawayo and Harare to talk about ways to incorporate more AIDS information in the school curriculum and to make EMC a training and patient care resource for the region.

Said Makadon, “I believe a comprehensive HIV/AIDS awareness and treatment program is critical for the future of Zimbabwe given the overwhelming nature of the epidemic.”

Other targeted priority specialty areas are maternal and child health, surgery, oncology, and emergency medicine.

According to Dube, for whom the opening of the hospital is the “fulfillment of a long held dream,” the senior management team is being interviewed and should be in place in the next few months.

The photo on the left, from Oct. 2000, shows the construction of EMC during an HMI visit. Right, in March this year the HMI team returned to see the completed facility.

The facility, which will be the most modern in Zimbabwe, should be ready to open in the next six months, according to Gillis, who provided technical consultation to the medical center’s leadership to ready the facility for commissioning. He also recommended that services be phased in over time, beginning with outpatient services. “Having visited the site during the early phases of construction in October 2000, and now seeing the facility close to being ready for patients, was testament to a lot of hard work and perseverance on the part of Dr. Dube and his colleagues,” said Gillis.

Despite limited resources and great challenges, there is a strong sense of pride and a spirit of hope among the professional staff of the new medical center, according to the HMI team. Dube and his colleagues are committed to building programs that will strengthen their health care system. “And we want to be there to help make those hopes and commitments a reality,” said Jeon.