The Outreaches of Tenwek Hospital
By Mike Chupp, KenyaJuly-September 2014
World Gospel Mission’s approach to evangelism and discipleship is through wholistic community transformational ministries. This recognizes that the gospel shapes not only what we believe, but also how we live. Just as Jesus ministered through preaching, teaching, and healing, WGM ministers through evangelism, education, and medical ministries. This has been our approach ever since the first missionaries were sent.
WGM currently has medical ministries in Africa, North America, and Latin America. One medical ministry that has grown from a small, single-nurse dispensary in 1937 to a large teaching hospital complex today is Tenwek Hospital in Kenya, East Africa.
In addition to the main 300-bed referral and training medical center located near the town of Bomet, three satellite clinics operate at Kaboson, Naikarra, and Ngito. Tenwek also ministers in the area of preventative medicine through Tenwek Community Health and Development. Since the start of TCHD, cases of malaria at the hospital have declined by 42 percent, cases of diarrheal diseases by 86 percent, and cases of measles by 99.6 percent. Moreover, TCHD’s mobile maternal and child health clinics have improved the health of pregnant women, reducing maternal morbidity and mortality.
Training national staff has been a focus at Tenwek since its inception. The first Kenyan administrator was appointed in 1972. In 1984, Tenwek Hospital employed 146 national staff members. Three years later, Tenwek School of Nursing opened, training Kenyan nurses for service at Tenwek Hospital and throughout Kenya. Tenwek now employs over 700 national staff, and nearly all of the top administrative posts are filled by Kenyans. Since the early 1990s, Tenwek Hospital has expanded its education efforts to include an internship program, a family medicine residency program, a surgical residency program, and an orthopedic surgery residency program. An eye clinic performs over 2,000 surgeries a year. Open heart surgery and joint replacement surgery are now done regularly at Tenwek Hospital. A CT scanner was dedicated for use and operational in September 2011.
Other Tenwek outreaches include immunization distribution, a hospice ministry, and chaplaincy training.
GIVE: You can partner financially with the outreach projects of Tenwek Hospital to ensure that more medical needs are met in rural Kenya. The ministries featured in this article are online at www.wgm.org/tenwek, www.wgm.org/tenwekschoolofnursing, and www.wgm.org/agc-correctional.
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