After two days of travel, I arrived at Entebbe Airport, exhausted but excited. The journey to Kiwoko took a few hours due to rush hour traffic, giving me time to take in my first glimpses of Uganda beyond the airport. On the way, I passed bustling streets, open markets, and stretches of greenery that felt both unfamiliar and welcoming. I also tried jackfruit for the first time—it tasted like a mix of lychee and mango, sweet and slightly chewy.
The following morning, I went to the chapel, where I introduced myself to the community members. After the service, there was a doctors’ meeting. During the meeting, doctors gave their hand-offs from the night. A light breakfast was served as well. After that, I went to the outpatient department (OPD), where I saw a wide range of pathologies, including giardiasis, hypertension, COPD, and osteoarthritis.
On my second day, I spent time in the NICU. The facility had CPAP and phototherapy, but what stood out most were the babies—tiny, fragile lives fighting to grow. Most were preterm, some weighing as little as 0.8 kg. I learned that there had been cases of conjoined twins and severe IUGR, with babies weighing only 0.5 kg. Reflecting on my limited exposure to neonatal care before this trip, I found the experience both shocking and inspiring. In my previous clerkships, I had seen the frustrations that come with long-term patient care—the moments when trust in treatment wavered. Here, despite limited resources and difficult prognoses, the dedication of the staff was unwavering. Some babies who struggled to survive might not make it, and families couldn’t always afford formula, yet there was no frustration—only quiet, focused care. That trust between healthcare professionals and their patients moved me in a way I didn’t expect.
The following day, I was on the surgical side of OPD and in the female and male wards. In the wards, I saw a man with metastasized prostate adenocarcinoma and a mid-shaft femur fracture, who was planned to be referred to the cancer center after his femur repair. Then, I saw a woman with a small bowel perforation (air-fluid level visible on X-ray) and a young girl with necrosis due to intussusception, both of whom had undergone small bowel resection. In OPD, I saw mostly fractures, musculoskeletal pain, an I&D case, and an anal fistula referred for a fistulogram, along with a triamcinolone injection into a keloid. Additionally, I saw a baby with a sacral ulcer featuring central skin necrosis, a deep depression, and a brown abscess around it. Due to the location and depth of the ulcer, and concerns about iatrogenic sciatic nerve injury, the patient was referred to plastic surgery at a higher-level care center for precise intraoperative drainage. I admired the consideration given to the lifelong complications the baby could face.
On Friday of that week, I was in the maternity ward in the morning. Most of the patients were post-operative C-section patients. In the afternoon, I saw a cornual ectopic pregnancy repair for the first time in the OR, followed by a C-section delivery. I found it encouraging that both physicians I worked with made an effort to educate me in different ways.
During the weekend, I was called in for a C-section case. After that, I explored the village and had a rolex, which was chapati with eggs and tomatoes. The rolex was very hot and much more filling than I expected. The food at the guesthouse, made by our lovely Rose and Joan, along with the street food around the village, has been great so far. Over the weekend, two of the guesthouse members, including myself, cooked.
Overall, my first week in Uganda has been filled with warmth and kindness. Villagers greet us in the mornings and afternoons, chapel members approach us with genuine curiosity, and the doctors we work with always take the time to ask about our experiences here, our specialty interests, and our goals for learning during our stay at Kiwoko Hospital.