About Us
Who We Are
Here at Kenya Mended Hearts Patients Association (KMHPA), we see the value in everyone. We want to be a catalyst for positive change, and since our beginnings in 2016, we’ve been driven by the same ideas we initially founded our Non-profit organization upon; support, empowerment, awareness and progress.
Our Vision
To have a community that values and understands the health of their hearts.
Our Mission
To advocate, educate and create awareness while giving hope to the patients, their families, friends and supporters.
Our Purpose
To have a community that values and understands the health of their hearts.
Our Values
Our values represent how we have evolved, and how we wish to continue working into the future. They guide the way we work together.
Our Core Values
COMMITTMENT TO GIVE SUPPORT
Our values represent how we have evolved, and how we wish to continue working into the future. They guide the way we work together.
EMPATHY
We are proud of our history and our achievements; we use our past successes to guide the future. We work with evidence to be a trusted voice on heart health – when the evidence changes, we change with it.
BUILD CONNECTIONS
We build genuine connections with our community, stakeholders, partners and customers. We strongly believe that what we do every day is for the benefit of others.
CARE TO PATIENTS & THEIR FAMILIES
We are courageous and think big, but we don’t ignore the details. We promote creativity and innovation in our thinking and actions to continually increase our reach and impact.
ACT WITH INTEGRITY
We are honest and take responsibility for our actions. We value the opinions of others and always assume positive intent. We enhance our trusted reputation through the responsible and transparent use of donor funds.
Our Team
FOUNDERS
Ruth W. Ngwaro
Co-Founder
Ruth Ngwaro is a passionate global health advocate, and a board member for Global Arch. Ruth has faced many challenges growing up with Congenital Heart Disease, including a lack of treatment capacity in Kenya at the time, costly surgeries, and numerous costly, doctor appointments for the management. Despite these challenges, Ruth was fortunate to be picked as a beneficiary by organizations that supported treatments for children with heart conditions like hers. This experience has inspired Ruth to become a fierce advocate for improving access to healthcare for vulnerable populations, particularly those with heart conditions. Her passion for global health and commitment to making a positive impact in the world make her an asset to any organization working towards improving access to healthcare for all.
Jackie M. Mbugua
Co-Founder
Walking through this path can drain you both emotionally and financially. Jackie knows this too well having to wear the hat of a caregiver and that of a patient. She traveled to India with a critically ill newborn to seek heart surgery since the service was not available in Kenya.
She believes in advocacy and research in the modern medical world that will see fetal echo cardiography done during antenatal clinics in kenya. This will help parents plan for the life saving surgery even before the baby is born.
ELECTED OFFICIALS
Sarah Maingi
Chief Executive Officer
Meet our CEO, Sarah Njoki Maingi a remarkable woman who wears many hats in her professional and personal life. As a mother to a child with congenital heart disease, Sarah brings a unique perspective to our non-profit organization.
Her personal experiences have driven her passion for improving the lives of those living with heart disease, and she is committed to ensuring that our organization provides the best possible support and resources to those in need.
Evans Majau
Programs Director
Evans Majau is a parent to a child born with a CHD. Though not a medical practitioner, Evans understands the challenges a family goes through with a kid born with NCDs and particularly a heart condition. Through mainstream media and social media, Evans has been creating awareness and offering psychosocial support to parents with kids born with CHDs and RHDs and Patients.
Evans has a belief that every child must live. Through intense lobbying for medical assistance and free surgery camps, Evans has been able to get Kenya Mended Heart’s and Patients Association members linked to medical professionals locally and internationally.
Rehema Athumani
Marketing Director
Rehema, who is now a mother of two, was diagnosed with a chronic heart disease at a tender age of two weeks and has undergone several open heart surgeries since then. It has been a journey of resilience and hope as l personally knows the struggles from mental, emotional, physical and financial standpoint that comes with such diagnosis.
I would like my health success to inspire many patients with heart diseases to know that being diagnosed with a heart condition is not necessary a death sentence but its treatable.
I put priority on my health, taking charge of risk factors that l can control. It is also important to engage doctors on all health issues so that they can better work with the patients to optimize the process of treatment and healing.
Sarah Arasa
Family Support Manager
Sarah Arasa knows first hand what it means to be a parent to a child born with destŕocardial congenital heart disease. Her daughter who was part of KMHPA was diagnosed at birth and lost the battle in 2017 at the age of 19.
Having raised a child diagnosed at birth, she can relate very well with what many parents are going through with their children at different stages of living with congenital heart disease.
She also wears the hat of a mum whose heart warrior lost the battle and so she brings to the table a great perspective on what both the patients and their families face as they seek treatment both in and out of the country.
Sarah is a pillar of hope and strives to encourage other parents whose heart warriors have lost their battles.
I put priority on my health, taking charge of risk factors that l can control. It is also important to engage doctors on all health issues so that they can better work with the patients to optimize the process of treatment and healing.
Eline Maswai
Co-ordinator
In early 2013, my son was diagnosed with Complex Congenital Heart Defect at 8 months, I was shattered. I had many questions whose answers I could not find. Despite it all, we had to face the new reality and come to terms with it. Treatment was only available outside the county and it was very expensive.
The future looked bleak and uncertain. It was at this desperate time that we came to know of and became a part of the Kenya Mended Hearts Patient Association. We met others like us who had walked or were walking this journey. Their support was invaluable and knowing that I had other parents who were like me to walk with took a big weight off my shoulders. Years, and several surgeries, later; my son is now in his pre-teens and the need for a support system has only grown with him! Thank God for KMHPA!
The Association offers him the support that he needs as he discovers himself and understands his condition more. I am happy to see that even with a heart condition, the restrictions that come with it and time out of school and in hospital; our children live to their full potential and achieve great successes. I am thankful for the KMHPA and honored to serve in the committee.
Our Partners
Since its inception in 2016, KMHPA has developed strong, strategic partnerships with companies and organizations that are essential to fulfill our mission to improve access to healthcare.
