I’ve been with Humanity Direct since the start, helping provide safe surgery for children in Uganda. My role is helping mobilise communities and healthcare facilities to identify vulnerable children in need of surgical care. I also work with our surgeons at Platinum Hospital to schedule operations and arrange patient’s pre and post-op care.
I also helped to establish and run our Glasses for Classes programme. I arrange our eye screening clinics throughout primary schools in Uganda and work with Betty, Sylvia and Major to run the eye tests and deliver the glasses so children with the poorest eye sight can see what their studies.
I spend a lot of time writing work plans, activity reports, sorting budgets, and handling correspondences from Humanity Direct concerning both programmes. Throughout my time I’ve been able to collate a lot of useful data on health, illness and health care among the underprivileged children and communities in Uganda.
Have you always wanted to work in healthcare?
Yes. My passion to work in healthcare is based on a profound interest to contribute to better quality of life for the people in low resource settings. I grew up in Uganda and I have a deeper understanding of the Uganda healthcare and health services delivery system and the challenges that impedes good healthcare services delivery and access. It is upon this background that I took post graduate studies in Health and Society so that I can develop analytical mind in understanding and dealing with societal factors that affects good quality of life. Therefore, I find working with Humanity Direct a natural fit for me.
As Humanity Direct’s Healthcare Coordinator what is a typical day like when you’re organising clinics and surgery for patients?
I usually wake up early at 6 am and say my morning prayer that lasts about 30 minutes. The first thing I do is to check on my other team members to see if they’re awake and ready for the days work. In most cases the patients are taken to the hospital a day before the scheduled surgery. However, in situations where the patient has to be picked from home for same day for surgery which is common patients who don’t live too far away, I make sure that I start driving before 7 am so that I am able to deliver the patients at hospital within no more than 3 hours.
Before driving off from home, I have to ensure that all the recording gadgets including the video and photo camera are intact including checking on the batteries.
At the hospital, the first thing is to check whether the surgeon and the entire care staff are in place and prepared and making sure that the children are clerked, consented and delivered to theatre. For most of the cases I am in theatre or my colleague during the operations to capture certain aspects of the surgical procedure.
After the operations, I always accompany the children to the recovery rooms and ensure that they together with the parents are comfortable. Finally, I have to make sure that myself or another team member is available at the time when the patients are being discharged.
What are the challenges of providing safe surgery for children in Uganda?
We are faced with high unmet need and many challenges for safe surgery for children in Uganda.
– On the side of providers, the major challenge is lack of improved technology especially in surgical equipment coupled with poor hospital infrastructure including unreliable water and electricity supply in surgical theatres and lack of drugs. There is also lack a lack of trained professionals to provide timely and safe surgical care. As well as surgeons there are very few anaesthetists trained in paediatric anaesthetics.
– The major challenge on the part of the population is lack of access to better quality services and qualified surgeons. High quality and safer surgical services are mainly in high end hospitals majorly found in Kampala the capital city and are very expensive. So majority of the poor people especially in rural areas cannot only afford the cost of care for their children but also the transport costs to access the facilities for proper diagnosis/examination. This challenges results into delays in seeking healthcare and avoidable mortality.
Do you have a memorable patient you’ve helped?
A boy called Samuel, who had a very bad bilateral cleft palate, is one of my most memorable patients because the transformation was astonishing. Samuel’s family were extremely poor and there was no way they could afford transport to reach the hospital over 100km away. His mum brought him to one of our clinics where we organised for him to have surgery including including the transport there and back.
Surgery was a success and everyone was astonished by the transformation. On discharge, the entire hospital staff contributed items to the family including cloths, household utensils, and food among others. When we returned home the entire community welcomed Samuel back and treated us as heroes.
One of my favourite operations though is posterior sagittal anorectoplasty (PSARP). A child who needs that operation means they’ve been born without an anal opening which constitutes a very high burden because they have to do a colostomy for passing stool and the hygienic challenges are very huge especially in our resource limited settings where it is so hard to access or afford colostomy bags. The surgical correction requires highly specialised skills and we have very few who can do that in the country or the entire region. We are so lucky that Dr. Sekabira, the first person to perform such surgery in Uganda has trained all the other surgeons in the region to perform the operation, is part of our team. It is very satisfying seeing that after surgery the children are able to go to the toilet normally. The operation is really transformative.
What do you like most about working for Humanity Direct?
I like the free sharing of ideas and respect of opinions. The biggest joy though is being able to tell a parent or carer that we can provide the medical care their child needs and seeing children return to full health after surgery.
What would you like to achieve with Humanity Direct for the next year?
I would like to see that our documentation or activity reports are able to attract as much donations as possible to enable us double the number of children that HD supports with surgical care and spectacles.
What do you like doing in your spare time?
I like going to local theatre to watch drama, playing and watching football, meditating, and spending my time with my wife Rachael and our four children. Matovu James Joseph (MJJ) 16 years, Bukenya Joel Joseph -13 years, Emmanuella Nabisaalu – 8 years, and Dominic Ssuuna – 6 years.
Dickson is a Social and Behavioural Scientist with particular interest in health research and programming. Dickson holds a Master of Social Sciences in Health and Society (MSS-HS) from Linkoping University, Sweden.
Dickson has over 17 years of experience in quantitative and qualitative community-based participatory research after starting his career in 2003 with the internationally recognised Rakai Health Sciences Program focused on HIV/AIDS. Dickson continues his work specialising in HIV/AIDS and reproductive health as a part time researcher at Makerere University School of Public Health.
