The RuDASA Annual Rural Doctor of the Year 2008:
The Pierre Jaques Award

Dr Munyadziwa Kwinda

The Rural Doctor of the year award 2008 was awarded to Dr Munyadziwa Kwinda. Dr Kwinda has been working in Donald Fraser Hospital in Limpopo since his community service 5 years ago. He has been the clinical manager for the last 4 years. He was the youngest clinical manager in the province at the time he was appointed, showing willingness to take on added responsibilities while other more senior doctors declined to do this. Under his leadership the staffing crisis has improved, and the team of doctors are dedicated to providing services to the district. Clinics are now visited on a weekly basis since May 2008, reducing the number of patients coming to the hospital OPD. The hospital team are involved in several outreach and training programmes together with the Rural Health Initiative. Antiretroviral therapy is also rendered at clinic level. There are a number of quality improvement projects in progress, dealing with improvements in service delivery. Dr Kwinda was the National Chairperson of Judasa in 2004, and is currently the Vice chairperson of SEHDASA and is on the board of directors for SAMA.

RUDASA presented a Rural Team of the Year award to the Church of Scotland Hospital, in KwaZulu Natal, specifically for their ongoing work in MDR and XDR TB. This team has many dedicated people, including 3 doctors who have worked at the hospital since 1984, 1986 and 1996 respectively. One of the doctors deregistered as a specialist physician and retrained as a rural doctor in order to work in this rural team. The Church of Scotland Hospital also has an integrated antiretroviral therapy programme in the district.

In addition to the rural doctor of the year award, this year RuDASA presented Certificates of Merit to Dr Colin Pfaff and Dr Mark Blaylock for their work in improving access to healthcare at Manguzi hospital; to Mrs Tracey Hudson for her contribution to rural health through recruitment of health care professionals; and to Ms Kerry Cullinan for her contribution towards rural health through journalism.

We would like to thank the Mail & Guardian for their generous sponsorship of this year’s awards.