Health

Introduction

Haller’s health programme aims to provide our communities with access to affordable basic health care and education. Through our health centre, education centre and health outreach services we hope to prevent illness before it arrives, and treat it effectively if it does. We work with the Ministry of Health and share our data with the KEMRI-Welcome Trust to deliver free health workshops and high-quality health care at low cost.

Treating Illness

Clinic

Haller provides a health clinic for the communities around Bamburi. Open daily, we are able to treat patients for most illnesses which don't require hospitalization. Due to an increase in patients attending the clinic, we have recently expanded. Our clinic has also been recognised by the Ministry of Health as a centre of excellence for rural outreach. 

Outreach service

We operate a health outreach service to help the most vulnerable and isolated  communities who are unable to travel to the main clinic. We have helped build a private space to consult and treat patients in each of the comumunities where we work. A dedicated 4-wheel drive vehicle takes Dr Lenox and Nurse Florence, along with their equipment and medication, to each community once a week according to a regular schedule. We hold regular meetings with each community to ensure our services meet their requirements, and to share ideas and experiences.

Preventing illness

Workshops

We hold workshops 4 times a week both at the health centre and at the outreach centres. These workshops focus on topics such as diarrheal illness, malaria prevention, safe water storage, family planning, HIV/Aids prevention, breastfeeding, nutrition, hygiene and first aid.  They are also a perfect opportunity to distribute mosquito nets and condoms, as they often attract large crowds. On average 500 people attend our workshops every month.

Immunisation and vaccinations

A weekly immunisation and vaccination programme is offered to each of the communities, with priority given to children under five and pregnant women. These injections protect people from common diseases such as mumps and measles.    

Female Health Training & Education: Repro ruler

The communities that Haller works with in rural parts of Mombasa have 15-20 people per household. This puts pressure on families to provide food for more mouths, and increases pressure on the land. In addition, it is estimated that one in ten of girls leave school due to pregnancy. Haller helps teach girls about their menstrual cycle and family planning, in addition to HIV/Aids education.

Haller has worked with Dr. Dieter Rottcher to develop an educational tool called the repro ruler which is distributed free to communities. These plastic, 30cm rulers help girls to understand and track their own menstrual cycle, so that they know when they are most at risk of becoming pregnant. They are distributed alongside workshops that also teach family planning and HIV/Aids awareness.

Eco-sanitary towels

Disposable sanitary towels are too expensive for many Kenyan girls, and the traditional use of rags can cause embarrassing leakages and health complications. As a result, many girls don’t go to school during menstruation and so miss many weeks of schools over the year, often causing them to drop out. Haller has been working with a small women’s group to set up a small workshop where community members can now learn how to make eco-sanitary towels out of low cost local materials, which are both affordable and hygienic. As well as providing income to the women making them, the new eco-towels are delivered in conjunction with educational workshops which aim to break the taboo connected with menstruation and increase female education.