HEAL - Health is Elemental to All Life

Providing a sustainable pathway toward improved individual and community living conditions in Muko Sub County

HEAL Program Mission

ACT Uganda’s HEAL Program works to reduce morbidity and mortality among the population in Muko Uganda by addressing key health impact outcomes, improving health literacy, and reducing health disparities within the population of Muko Sub-County.  HEAL aims to use its resources to create the greatest impact possible for population health in Muko, Uganda.

ACT’s Health Impact Priorities:

1. Health Outcomes: Save lives, improve health outcomes, and work toward achieving healthy populations

2. Health Literacy: Empower the population to seek out accurate, evidence-based health resources and information

3. Health Equity: reduce health inequities or disparities among different population groups in Muko, Uganda

ACT Uganda’s HEAL Program is currently led by Judith Tukahirwa, ACT's first Maverick Leadership Scholar who has now earned a nursing degree in midwifery. Judith works closely with the local District Health Educator to identify current relevant health promotion topics where community education is most needed.

HEAL conducts health education sessions at local health centers, schools, and churches on a weekly basis. These topics vary by the audience in attendance, and the top needs identified at the time. This flexibility is unique for an NGO, but it empowers the ACT staff to determine which topics are most influential and most beneficial for each session’s audience. As long as these topics align with ACT US goals and local Ugandan public health challenges, the ACT Uganda staff is empowered to educate and address the issue using their own approach. For example, ACT staff recently learned that mothers expecting their 2nd, 3rd, or 4th child are less likely to seek out prenatal care compared to those expecting their first child, increasing the risk associated with those pregnancies. Judith worked to organize a health education session at a local health center for expecting mothers and mothers of young children. She explained the importance of seeking out prenatal care, even in a second, third, or fourth pregnancy, and discussed other important issues for expecting mothers such as postpartum depression, infant vaccination, and infant nutrition. As highly educated members of the local community, our staff are uniquely positioned to provide culturally-appropriate support and evidence-based information where it is most critically needed.

• Prevent mortality from non-communicable diseases. 

• Promote mental health and well-being.

• Strengthen the prevention and treatment of substance abuse, including alcohol.

• Improve access to family planning

• Eliminate all forms of violence against all women and girls.

• Eliminate all harmful practices, such as child, early, and forced marriage.

• Recognize and value unpaid care and domestic work through the promotion of shared responsibility within the household and the family as nationally appropriate.

• Achieve access to safe and affordable drinking water for all.

• End open defecation, paying special attention to the needs of women and girls and those in vulnerable situations.

Help us help them succeed! In order for these education sessions to occur, HEAL funding for staff salaries relies completely on donations. A donation of $1000 will support three months of education sessions, empowering our staff to provide vital health promotion guidance to those most at risk throughout all 74 villages in Muko Sub County. As a sponsor, you will receive monthly reports from education sessions (with photos) and a framed photo to display.

What Else Is Included In The HEAL Program?

A new initiative of a monthly journal club discussion, held over Zoom, was initiated in fall 2023. In Journal Club, Muko High School students and teachers who are interested in science join ACT staff and U.S. volunteers to discuss a research paper relevant to Ugandan public health. The club focuses on developing critical thinking skills related to science and health literacy. This club operates at almost no cost, but it has been instrumental in guiding current and future leaders of this rural community toward improved information-seeking behavior. Journal Club, led by Robin Stottlemyer in Michigan, continues to meet monthly and it has become popular among students, who even volunteered to walk many miles to the high school over holiday break so they could attend a session over ZOOM.

HEAL previously conducted Health Dramas…

Health education in the form of theatrical dramas attracted large crowds outside churches and among students in primary and secondary schools throughout the region. These dramas guided audience members on key topics like menstrual hygiene, full-body hygiene, alcoholism, and domestic violence. Although this approach was well-received and popular throughout the community, drama performances were expensive. It was determined that their impact was not large enough to justify the high costs and dramas ended in Fall 2023.