Eight Days in Tanzania: The Tungamalenga Dispensary

The Hurley family (Randy, Kari, daughter Angela and 7 yr old grandson Wyatt) were in Tanzania 10 days before the medical group arrived to coincide our visit with Wyatt’s Christmas break schedule. We were able to visit Barnabus Khawage, the recently retired clinical officer at the Tungamalenga Dispensary. The new clinical officer is Dr Asajili Sanga; Dr Asajile was born and raised in Ilula Tanzania and is a graduate of the Ilula Clinical Officer training school. As it is here in the USA, it often is hard to attract health care professionals to serve in rural locations. In the USA, as in Tanzania, most training programs are located in urban areas and once finished with training, it is often difficult to attract health care professionals to practice in rural locations. One of the original goals of the Ilula Health Institute was to identify local students, train them locally then have them serve locally in rural dispensaries operated by the Tanzanian Lutheran Diocese. Mission accomplished: Dr Asajile is a great example of that philosophy in action! Tungamalenga is paired with Shepherd of the Valley Lutheran Church in Apple Valley: they recently completed construction of a lab at this dispensary.

Randy and Kari Hurley

Dr Asajile at Tungamalenga Dispensary

The recently constructed outpatient lab

Examples of lab tests available: (for comparison Tsh 2500 is approximately USD $1) UPT: urine pregnancy test; Widal test is a typhoid test; MRDT (Malaria rapid diagnostic test) and HIV testing are provided by the government at no cost