Kamuzu Central Hospital
Malawi
Haukeland University Hospital (HUH) is collaborating with Kamuzu Central Hospital (KCH) which is a government run central hospital funded entirely by the Malawi Ministry of Health (MoH). With 750 beds it is the second largest hospital in Malawi. The hospital is a referral hospital for Malawi’s central region, and provides services for a population of about five millions.
HUH and KCH have collaborated since 2007 in the fields of general and orthopaedic surgery, and maternal health, in collaboration with Oslo University Hospital (OUH) and the University Hospital of Northern Norway (UNN). The projects were financed by the Norwegian Embassy in Lilongwe and by Fredskorpset (FK Norway). Private donors in Bergen have supported the programmes with funding for purchase of equipment and support for the training programmes.
An exchange programme financed by FK Norway has been an important contribution to help boost the infrastructure at KCH. Through this co-operation both midwives, medical engineers, laboratory technicians and radiologists from HUH have been working at Bwaila Maternity Hospital/KCH for one year each during 2008-2016, and their Malawian counterparts have been working at HUH. Approximately 30 staff members form HUH and KCH have been participants in the exchange programme.
The collaboration in Maternal Health was terminated 1. March 2015. The collaboration in Surgery/Orthopaedics is continuing and is now financed by Norad as a Norhed programme: «Capacity building in postgraduate surgical training and research in Malawi".
The training programme is a collaboration between HUH and the University of Bergen, KCH, Queen Elisabeth Central Hospital and the College of Medicine, Malawi.