Sikonge Mission Hospital Update

Dear sisters and brothers in the UK,

I greet you in the name of Jesus Christ. I hope this finds you all in good health and spirit.

Sikonge Mission Hospital continues to serve the population of Sikonge through blessings and challenges.

As you might know my family and I moved back to Denmark after nearly four years in Sikonge. But I am still working with the hospital through calls and video-meetings every week as well as visits three times a year. I was there in late January and will go there again in April.

I work with the leadership of the hospital that consists of doctor in charge Peter Songoro, hospital director pastor Wilson Nkumba, and our new nurse in charge Adam Ejide who got the position last summer. Adam is a young passionate nurse who worked in our maternity ward before. He is known for a rare combination of being warm and kind and at the same time not tolerating substandard treatment and not being afraid to speak up. He has turned out to be the right choice and has learned very fast about management through his experienced colleagues Dr Peter and pastor Wilson. Personally, I am very grateful that we now have a hospital leadership team that are all honest and hard-working with an unwavering focus on strengthening the hospital for the sake of the patients. It is uncommonly seen, strong and committed team.

The whole hospital leadership team asked me to send warm greetings and thank you for your support in funding as well as prayers. Both are equally important to us.

Free services to the poor

The funds you sent for our exemption program have helped 5,540 women give birth or getting C-section for free in 2025, as well as giving many children free bed stay, and an even larger number of pregnant women and newborns free check-ups. It also helped us give individual exemption to 69 persons last year. Those 69 people are not part of the automatically exempted groups (mothers and children) but are extra vulnerable due to severe poverty or social problems. Our social worker screens them through a list of criteria making sure the funds are used for those who need it the most.

It is at the core of our hospital to be able to provide free treatment to the most vulnerable as part of our vision is to identify every life as a gift from God – including the poorest of the poor. We want to follow Jesus’ example of caring for the poor and the outcasts society.

HIV

We started the year with US Aid withdrawing all funds for HIV-work in practically all parts of Tanzania overnight. The staff in our HIV-department chose to work for free for more than a month knowing that their patients would be without any health service if they left. It is good example of committed health personnel. Last week the organisation leading the HIV-work (MDH, partner of US Aid) managed to get funds for February and March, so our staff just got paid. They also expect to get funds for April, May and June so for now it looks like the HIV work will continue. God has once again shown how he can work wonders.

Current focus on improving health services

After years of working on building a strong administration with democratic decision-making and financial transparency, the hospital management is now focused on raising the quality of the health services. That is not done overnight, but we have taken some important steps in 2025.

An example is implementing the use of nursing care plans to strengthen the link between the doctors and nurses, and to make sure that there is a clear plan for each patient. An example of a nursing care plan could be a plan for a mother admitted after C-section: a medicine schedule, how often she needs her wound cleaned, and how often she needs to get up and move to help the body recover and so on.

Our main priority is mothers and children as these are the most vulnerable groups and make up the majority of our patients.

Dreams for future development

In 2026 we dream of being able to renovate the maternity ward. The building where women give birth and the building where they stay with their newborns afterwards are very run-down and have too little space. Currently three women give birth in one room at a time with only some fabric in between them. The windows face the main pass way in the hospital, so if the windows are opened, people can see right in the delivery room. There are no other windows, so the delivery room gets warm and lacks fresh air passing through.

After giving birth, they stay in a crowded ward – I have more than once seen two new mothers and their newborns sharing one bed.

Outside the ward we had a toilet and a bath which collapsed last week. We thank God that there was no one in there when it happened! This year has brought unusually heavy rainfalls, and it has taken its toll on many houses in Sikonge, and now also the maternity washroom.

For now, they use the washroom of the children’s ward, but it is too far from the maternity ward for a newborn mother to go.

We managed to get some funds for renovating the maternity ward from a Danish local church, but it is far from enough. Our main challenge for now is therefore finding funds for building a new washroom and next renovating maternity department to give women a reasonable place to give birth with more privacy and better circulation of air. If you would like to hear more about this plan and see a breakdown budget, let me know. I am also happy to correspond with the youth organisation that was so kind as to collect money for the exemption program last year.

For now, we ask you to pray for us to succeed in improving the conditions of the maternity department, but we also encourage you to pray for the mothers that are birth in our facility every day. It means so much knowing that we have brothers and sisters praying for us and the patients that we serve.

I send warm greetings from Denmark as well as from my good colleagues in Tanzania!

Sr Mia Toldam Korsgård

Long-distance missionary in Sikonge and head of programme

Moravian Mission Denmark