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First established as a military barrack and then as a medical ward for injured Italian soldiers, the Gondar hospital was used largely to treat military personnel during the Italian period. After the war, it continued to provide service to the people in the region despite the severe shortage of health professionals.
In 1954 when the Medical College was established, the hospital was designated as a training facility and it continued to operate in that capacity until the mid-70s. In 1978 the College was authorized to establish a medical school to train MDs in addition to other health professionals such as health officers, community nurses and sanitarians. Today the Hospital serves as a teaching facility as well as the most important primary patient-care providing center for the region. Because of the medical school, the Gondar Hospital has become one of the leading medical centers in the county. It is the second largest hospital in the country, after Black Lion Hospital in Addis Ababa, and the only referral hospital in the entire North Western part of Ethiopia.
Each year, about 65 doctors provide care to more than 9,000 inpatients and over 186,000 outpatients. Although the hospital has a 400-bed capacity, it admits close to 500 patients all year round with some patients sleeping in corridors and, in some cases, in tents. Close to 500 patients visit the hospital every day. The College has several satellite programs in the surrounding areas including Dabat, Kolla Diba, Gorgora, Ebinat, Tseda, Aikel, Tikel Dingya and Debark and the hospital serves as a training and referral unit for these centers.
Despite the outstanding service the College and the hospital have provided to the region for so many years, there has been very little effort made to improve the physical condition of the buildings at the site. Most of the buildings are in such a state of poor repair that the hospital staff as well as the College faculty are having difficulty in performing their duties effectively. Set up in an old army barrack style, the hospital wards constitute a collection of bungalows connected by very rough and narrow gravel paths with steep slopes and elevated stairs that limit easy access for patients. Transporting patients from one part of the hospital to another as well as moving equipment such as oxygen tanks and medical testing equipment is a formidable task. This is particularly true when transporting patients with fresh wounds that have to be moved with caution. The Operation Theatre, located in one of these row houses, is inaccessible by beds equipped with wheels. Therefore, patients scheduled for operations, sometimes, have to be transported by a stretcher. In short, the physical structure of many of the buildings used by the hospital and the College are unfit for a modern hospital or a teaching institution.
This problem has been recognized since the mid-70s, but there was very little effort made to alleviate the shortage of space in the hospital. In the last few years we have seen an encouraging sign as a result of the concerted effort made by many organizations and individuals to address the infrastructural bottlenecks.
It is particularly fitting to mention the efforts made by two major organizations – The Gondar Relief, Rehabilitation and Development Association (GRRDA) in Ethiopia and the Gondar Development and Cooperation Organization (GDCO) established by individuals in the Diaspora to create a significant level of awareness about the plight of the College and the hospital. There is a concerted effort to raise a sufficient amount of funds to make the dream of building a modern hospital in Gondar a reality.
In 2001, the GDCO, the GRRDA and the Medical School joined hands to initiate an ambitious project – the construction of a new 400-bed capacity hospital at an estimated cost of US$9 million at a site on the campus of the Medical School. The groundbreaking ceremony for the construction of the new hospital was completed on February 8, 2003. Construction work is expected to take over two years. On completion, the new hospital will exceed the current capacity of the hospital and it will be equipped with state-of-the-art equipment. It will have the capacity to provide modern health services to more than 4 million people residing in the region and it will also serve as a major training center for health professionals in Ethiopia. The construction of the new hospital would be a major milestone in the development of the region.
The GCMS is located in one of the poorest areas in Ethiopia. Conditions in the region are not any better today than they were in the 1950s. The area served by the hospital is heavily impacted by epidemics of malaria, meningitis, HIV/AIDS and typhoid. One of the main reasons why the medical College was located in Gondar in 1954 was because of the malaria epidemic that devastated the region in 1952-53. According to records maintained by the then Provincial Governor, the malaria epidemic in 1953 wiped out over 7,000 people out of an estimated population of 100,000 in the Dembia area alone. In the town of Koll Diba, 34 km south of Gondar, it was estimated that 20 percent of the population died from malaria during the same year.
Health conditions in Gondar Region mirror the situation in the rest of Ethiopia. As one of the poorest countries in Africa, Ethiopia’s economic and social indicators show a cycle of poverty characterized by high level of illiteracy, infant mortality, malnutrition, unemployment, etc. According to government reports infant mortality in Ethiopia in 2001 was 116 per 1,000 births, life expectancy was 42, one out of four people suffered from malnutrition, and close to 2.2 million people were infected with HIV/AIDS. In terms of health services, there was one doctor for every 36,000 people, there was one hospital bed for every 5,500 people, and per capita expenditure for health services was $5.00. By contrast, infant mortality in developing countries for the same year was 81, life expectancy was 59, the ratio of doctors to population was 1: 1000, and per capita expenditure for health was $71.00. According to the Ethiopian Ministry of Health standards, 1 hospital is expected to serve 250,000 people and 1 health center is to cover 25,000 people. Based on a population of 67 million, the ratio of population to hospitals in 2003 was 1:580,000 and population to health centers was 1:160,000. The table below gives a clear picture of the dismal health conditions in the country.
| Ethiopia: Health Indicators, 2001 | # |
|---|---|
| Total population (in millions) | 65 |
| Life Expectancy | 42 |
| Death Rate per 1,000 people | 15 |
| Mortality rate (under 5 per 1,000 people) | 172 |
| Infant mortality rate (per 1,000 people) | 116 |
| Doctors to population ratio | 1:36,000 |
| Hospital bed per population ratio | 1:5,500 |
| Population with access to health care (%) | 52 |
| Population with access to improved water | 24 |
| Population living on less than $1.00 per day (%) | 31 |
| Malnutrition prevalence (% children under 5) | 47 |
| Health expenditure as % of GDP | 5 |
| Health budget as % of government budget | 7 |
| Per capita health expenditure (in US$) | $5.00 |
| Total number of hospitals | 115 |
| Total number of health centers | 412 |
| Total number of hospital beds | 11,710 |
| No. of adults living with HIV/AIDS (in millions) | 2.2 |
| Adult (15-45 age) HIV prevalence rate (%) | 6.6 |
More Information provided by the following organizations:
Ethiopians in the Diaspora are committed to the completion of the
new hospital because they believe that the provision of better health
services will contribute immensely to the development of the region.
The UN Millennium Development Goals and efforts of multilateral and
bilateral agencies as well as that of non-governmental organizations
recognize the vital linkages between elimination of diseases such as
malaria, tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS and social and economic development.
Accordingly, we urge all our friends to contribute what they can to
this worthwhile goal.
The Gondar College of Medical Sciences (GCMS) was established as a Public Health College and Training Center in 1954 through the cooperation of the Ethiopian Government, the USAID (then known as the Point Four), the WHO and the UNICEF. The primary mission of the institution was to train health professionals that would play a major role in alleviating the serious shortage of medical staff in the country.
The program was established based on a unique concept that builds on the philosophy of community-focused health service. As such, the emphasis was to develop a comprehensive health program that utilizes the expertise of a cadre of professionals that operate as a team in dealing with community health problems. Thus, the program trains health officers, community nurses, environmental health officers and lab technicians side by side, and upon graduation, assigns them to work as a team in a health center that is designated to serve a certain community. The team tries to develop a symbiotic relationship among its members to maximize the quality of service it provides. This concept is still central to the educational philosophy of the GCMS.
Gondar was selected as the site (instead of Jima which was recommended in the initial appraisal to establish a health training center in Ethiopia) because of the devastation the region sustained from the malaria epidemic of 1952-53.
In 1961, the status of the College was changed to a University and it was placed under the direction of the Haile Selassie I University, now known as Addis Ababa University. The diploma program of the College was upgraded to a BS degree in Public Health. Over the next 20 years, the College (as it was widely known) played a prominent role in preparing over 1,147 professionals.
In 1978 the institution was authorized to establish a medical school to train MDs in addition to other health professionals such as health officers, community nurses and sanitarians.
Since 1979, when the first class enrolled in the School’s medical program, the College has grown both in size and function. In 1994, the College was renamed the Gondar College of Medical Sciences (GCMS) and its mission was redefined to include the training of MDs and other health professionals, to undertake basic research in health sciences, and to serve as a referral health center for the region. However, the condition of many of the facilities essentially remained unchanged. Today the Gondar Medical School has over 2,000 students enrolled in medical and health science fields ranging from nursing and public health to different fields of medicine including internal medicine, surgery, pediatrics, obstetrics/gynecology, radiology, dentistry and orthopedics, to name a few. The students are recruited from all regions of Ethiopia.
Over 200 staff members are engaged in teaching, in conducting research and in participating in various community health service programs. Since it started granting MDs, over 1,200 doctors have graduated from the College. Many of these graduates are providing valuable service in different parts of Ethiopia. According to a 1998 institutional report, over 3,413 health professionals have graduated from the College. By 2000, the total number of health professional graduates had increased to 4,419. It is estimated that the College and its hospital serve over 4 million people in the Gondar region alone and also act as a referral unit for over 39 rural clinics. The hospital is the only major referral unit for hospitals and health centers located in the neighboring provinces of Gojam and Tigray.
This year the College will celebrate its 50th Anniversary. There are plans to rename the College the College of Medicine and Health Sciences. New programs in Economics and Management Sciences, Social Science and Humanities, Natural Sciences and Veterinary Medicine will also be established in addition to the programs in Medicine.
When the College opened its doors in 1954, most of its programs were housed in renovated buildings built during the Italian period. With the increase in the number of students and range of programs offered, the need for new facilities has become more pressing than ever. There is an urgent need for additional lecture halls, classrooms, labs and specialized rooms and accommodation facilities. Many of the classrooms lack computer facilities, video equipment and some of the modern medical facilities needed to enhance learning. Today the College has an academic and a residential accommodation for 800 students and a 400-bed hospital with different types of services. This facility is woefully inadequate to meet the increasing demand for services and accommodation of patients. As the demand for more health services in the region continues to increase, the College will be stretched to its limits in terms of capacity, availability of resources and the ability to provide quality services.
When the Kolla Diba Clinic, 34 miles south of Gondar, was first established in 1954 to help the College in its training program, the people of the woreda contributed Birr 1.50 per head to build the clinic. Their contribution was matched by funds from the Ethiopian Government and the USAID to form a “Joint Fund.” This is a profound concept we need to emulate to make the dream of building a new hospital in Gondar a reality.
As indicated in the message from the Executive Board of the GDCO, our objective is to raise $100,000.00 in 2004 from Ethiopians in the Diaspora. The Executive Board has mandated its branches in the USA and Europe to approach all friends of the GCMS to contribute to this worthy cause. We have branches in many states and we encourage you to contact the one in your city.
Should you decide to send your contribution directly to the account maintained by the GDCO at Sun Trust Bank, you can send your checks or money order to the Executive Board Treasurer at the following address:
