/ 25 November 2016

Health care for back home

Musa Myeni
Musa Myeni

Staffing at rural hospitals is a global issue that the Umthombo Youth Development Foundation has addressed with an innovative solution. Founded in 1999 by Dr Andrew Ross, the project identifies rural youth in KwaZulu-Natal who have the interest and ability to study a health science degree, and who agree upon graduation to work at their local rural hospital for the same number of years they were supported for.

“Umthombo is a proactive way of finding solutions to significant problems,” says Dr Gavin MacGregor, director of the Foundation. “Despite investing in rural youth from non-fee paying rural schools, through our academic and social mentoring support programme, our students have achieved a 93% university pass rate over the last four years. In addition, we have produced 257 health science graduates covering 16 different health science disciplines, of which 82 are medical doctors.”

The project started out of an ongoing crisis of a shortage of healthcare staff at Mosvold Hospital, a rural hospital in Ingwavuma, northern KwaZulu-Natal, that serves in excess of 100 000 patients. When Ross founded the initiative there were only two doctors on call. There wasn’t a dentist or radiographer, and service delivery was difficult.

“We had people telling us, ‘it’s impossible, you’ll never find the right people, and even if you do, they’ll never succeed at university. And even if they do, they’ll never go back home to practice.’”

But it does work. Today, Umthombo fully supports 200 youth with full-cost bursaries, ensuring they can concentrate on their studies instead of going hungry or worrying about accommodation issues. Equally important, Umthombo has a team of 14 mentors led by Dumsani Gumede who provide academic and social mentoring support to assist them to address the challenges they face when they reach university, and through their transition periods from rural school child to medical science university student to trainee doctor in their community.

“A lot of the students arrive at university and are faced with many challenges,” says MacGregor. “For many, they have never been to the city and are faced with the fast pace not only of academic life, but city life, which can be distracting. Additionally their mother tongue is not English, and all lectures take place in English, and in some cases there is strong pull to support those at home.

“We counteract this through our mentor programme led by Dumsani Gumede and his team of mentors who constantly check in with our students, and help them cope physically, mentally and emotionally.”

Students also make a soft transition into the hospital environment by completing four-week internships in their rural hospitals in every year of their training, where they get to familiarise themselves with the staff and working practice.

The health care professionals who return to their rural communities have additional empathy for their communities and are able to communicate in local vernacular, often with familiar community members. They inherently understand rural health care. Additionally as health care providers who live and earn in their communities they in turn support small community businesses.

Dr Lungile Hobe graduated in 2011 and now works at the rural hospital in Mseleni, the same hospital where her mother practiced as a nurse. These visits inspired her to be a doctor. “Thirty per cent of our patients are infected with HIV, and I am the main source of health care for my community,” she says.

Says MacGregor: “Working in partnership with the department of health we now service 17 rural hospitals. And 63% of our graduates who return to these rural hospitals are still working there. If you add in graduates working at rural NGOs, this percentage increases to 70! This confirms that the investment in rural youth as a way of addressing the shortages of staff at rural hospitals is working.”