The Children's Surgical Hospital in Entebbe is the only completely free medical hospital of excellence in Uganda, and the only building designed - pro bono - by Renzo Piano and TAMassociati for all of Africa. A dream that two friends, Doctor Gino Strada who believed that excellent medicine was everyone's right, and the star architect who sees beauty, which is also good, as man's greatest aspiration, made come true.
In 2007, EMERGENCY opened the Salam Centre for Cardiac Surgery in Sudan, followed by the Children’s Hospital in Uganda in 2021. These two facilities together with the Regional Programme, which ensures referral and continuity of care for patients coming from over 30 countries, are the backbone of the African Network for Medical Excellence (ANME). The facility offers free paediatric surgical treatment to children and adolescents suffering primarily from congenital malformations, urological and gynaecological problems, anomalies of the gastro- intestinal tract, biliary system pathologies, and cheiloschisis – medical needs that do not have other reference facilities in the country to treat them.
The Hospital employs a staff of more than 400 people, 90% of whom are local. Since its opening it has carried out more than 3,600 operations and 25,000 visits, analyses, medications and physiotherapy sessions. Furthermore, like all EMERGENCY hospitals, it is a training center for extremely necessary medical and healthcare professions. In Uganda, for a population of around 20 million children there were only four paediatric surgeons.
Since EMERGENCY's vision is to care for the life as well as the pathology of patients, the NGO is in relationship with around 30 local organizations that can help them in social rehabilitation once discharged.