2019 Annual Programs Technical Report, Village Health Works

Village Health Works is a grassroots, 501(c) (3) non-profit organisation that provides quality, compassionate, dignified health care in rural Burundi, East Africa. We use a holistic model, focusing first on treating illnesses through primary health care services, then using our unmatched community engagement to implement programs in sustainable agriculture, education and economic development to address the social determinants of health. With a catchment population of 120,000 people, the clinic program focuses on improving health and wellbeing through the provision of quality health services in the area of infectious diseases, non-communicable diseases, maternal and child health, and mental health. Furthermore, there is a public health component to the program that targets disease prevention, the adoption of a healthy lifestyle, family planning as well as engaging the communal structures to raise awareness of sensitive areas like sexual violence. Our approach is community-driven and as such, we place importance on delivering services via community health workers, who are formally integrated into the health system. The economic development program has a strategy of tackling poverty through income generating activities. Under this program, community members form cooperatives in which they receive agricultural input, training and routine capacity building activities. Cooperatives are organised around traditional farming, fish farming and services such as baking and sewing. Additionally, the economic development program has a food security program which aims at tackling nutrition in the catchment as well as supporting the clinic patients with diverse and nutritious food. In the community, the food security program focuses on improving agricultural practices through improving fertility of lands for farming. The education program currently operates on-site and focuses on delivering high quality education. To achieve desired students’ outcomes, the program implements a model with two major components; teacher training and strengthening support systems for pupils. The teacher training component aims to equip teachers with the skills and knowledge to make classroom instruction child-centered. The other component concentrates on creating a safe, healthy, and congenial area in which children learn and thrive. As such, activities carried out under this component include: screening children for malnutrition, providing de-worming treatment, health promotion, after-school programming, and activities designed to promote girls’ education and gender equality.