A Proposed Palliative Architecture For Children With Cancer; A Case Study Of Kawempe Home Care

Photo: Courtesy Photo

Background

Cancers are a major cause of death in Uganda, along with diabetes, heart diseases, HIV/AIDS, and stroke. They affect any part of the body and can be influenced by one's behavior or exposure to risky conditions. Palliative care, defined by the World Health Organization, is an approach that improves the quality of life of patients and their families by preventing and addressing pain and other physical, psychosocial, and spiritual problems.

Hospice/Palliative Care is designed to provide supportive care to people in the final phase of a terminal illness, focusing on comfort and quality of life rather than cure. It provides multi-disciplinary services such as nurses, doctors, medical social services, dietary and counseling, anesthesiology, clergy, speech therapy, home care, and bereavement services. Hospice programs also offer respite care workers, trained volunteers, who take over the patient's care for a few hours. The philosophy of hospice is to support the patient's emotional, social, and spiritual needs as part of treating the whole person.

Hospice development in Africa began in the late 1970s in Zimbabwe and South Africa, with the first hospice facility in Harare in 1979. It spread to Kenya, Swaziland, Botswana, Tanzania, Zambia, Sierra Leone, Morocco, Congo-Brazzaville, Nigeria, Malawi, Egypt, and the Gambia. Hospice Africa Uganda (HAU) was founded in Uganda in 1993 and currently cares for 4,600 patients annually. There are 136 hospice and palliative care organizations in 15 African countries. Kawempe Home Care, a non-profit organization in Uganda, opened the New Hope Children's hostel in 2016 to provide specialist care and a safe home environment for children diagnosed with cancer. However, the hostel faces challenges such as limited space, non-conducive environment, and hygiene concerns.

This study aims to address these challenges by proposing a design for a "children with cancer home" that meets the needs of palliative care multi-disciplinary staff and patients.

Read the full text here:

Finished report- Proposed Palliative Care for children (Arnold).pdf

Download PDF • 1.55MB

Author Bio:

Arnold Ahumuza is an architecture student at Makerere University Kampala.