KARUDEC HISTORY

Kagando Hospital was founded in 1965, in buildings which had previously housed a Government Leprosy settlement as a District General Hospital by Africa Inland Mission, under Dr Carl Becker, who had himself been forced out of Eastern DR Congo by the Simba rebellion of 1964. Today the Hospital has an up to 300-bed capacity, a School of Nursing and Midwifery (700+ students), a Primary school and Nursery school (350+ pupils), a Mothers Care Home, a Microfinance Project, Christian Nurture/Church Ministry; a Farm, and Community Outreach projects for Palliative Care, Mental Health Outreach, HIV support, Maternal Child Health clinics and training, There is also a Community Water supply programme, as well as Sanitation, Agriculture, Nutrition, Entrepreneurship, and Women’s Health Programmes.

From a leprosarium housed in asbestos bus-like huts, Kagando Hospital has grown to the current 300 bed capacity hospital serving a very big hinterland equivalent to that of a Government referral hospital. Over the years, Kagando Hospital established partnerships as far back as 1965, when in partnership with Uganda Protestant Medical Bureau (UPMB) and Mengo Hospital it trained Nursing aides. Dr. Rob Morris, during the post Idi Amin era was responsible for fully integrating Kagando Hospital into a fully-fledged Church of Uganda supported project. It is during this period that UPMB became very active in supporting faith-based hospitals. Not only did it supply the hospitals with Drugs and other sundries but also established the crucial link between the hospitals and the Ministry of Health (MoH). Under the auspices of UPMB, Government in 1980 posted the first qualified Government Medical Assistant to the Hospital. 

In 1984, in response to the development needs of the local community, Kagando Hospital transitioned into a multifaceted community development entity called Kagando Rural Development Centre (KARUDEC) under Church of Uganda, serving over 150,000 people in Kasese District where it is located, with some from surrounding districts of Kabarole, Bundibugyo, Kyenjojo, Kibaale, Bushenyi and the neighbouring Eastern parts of the Democratic Republic of Congo, providing social and spiritual services in a community where close to 90% of the people are peasant farmers dependent on subsistence farming for their livelihood. KARUDEC has since been a catalyst to development in the Five Sub counties of Kisinga, Kyondo, Munkunyu, Kyarumba and Lake Katwe. The Government has since recognised Kagando Hospital as the headquarters of Bukonzo East health sub district with services extending to people of eastern part of the Democratic Republic of Congo. KARUDEC is located at the foot hills of Mt. Ruwenzori in the Kasese District which straddles the Equator. 

The District is bordered by the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the west. District headquarters in Kasese Town are located approximately 359 kilometers by road west of Kampala, Uganda’s Capital City. The District is home to Queen Elizabeth National Park and the Rwenzori Mountains National Park.