Our History
The historical background and development of SLF take on board, the initial establishment of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Tanzania (ELCT)-Infusion Units Project (ELCT-IUP) that began at Machame Lutheran Hospital –Hai District in Kilimanjaro Region in 1977. The Infusion Units Project was the Church Project under the Medical Directorate of Evangelical Lutheran Church in Tanzania established with the main objective of helping various Hospitals to set up Infusion production Units in Tanzania. At that time the demand and availability of Life Saving drugs, particularly Intravenous Fluids (infusions) for patients in need were far above the supply needed and this was a big problem, especially in rural areas where the transport of supplies was difficult. In order to deal with this shortage, the concept of local hospital-based infusions production was pursued and coordinated through the initiative of Dr. Georg Dieter Kamm, Anaesthetist and Missionary of the Bavarian Lutheran Church -German (Now known as Mission One World) who was working in Machame Lutheran hospital at that time.
The installation of the first hospital-based infusions production unit at Machame Lutheran hospital using a Reverse Osmosis (RO) water purification system to produce the needed quality purified water and the availability of other necessary inputs (i.e. consumables and packaging materials) enabled the hospital to produce enough infusions to meet its need and made continuous availability of these lifesaving infusions to the neighboring hospitals.
The continuous access and availability of infusions produced at Machame hospital was the motivating force behind for Dr. Georg Kamm to request for the financial support from the Lutheran Church in Germany (EZE, later EED) to establish the first center in Machame hospital with its offices in 20 feet metal containers to coordinate activities of the Infusion Units Project as the Project Coordinator with Mr. Zakaria Nkya as the Project Technician and Mr. Wilson Mlaki as the Project Pharmacist. The activities included the installation of ten (10) more similar hospital infusion production units, training of hospital infusion production personnel, and conducting supportive supervision and preventive maintenance of hospital infusion production units.
The success of this single venture led other hospitals to request for installation of similar hospital infusions production units in Tanzania and other African Countries e.g. DRC, Kenya, Ethiopia, etc., and hence the creation of a project under the umbrella of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Tanzania known as ELCT-Infusion Units Project (ELCT-IUP) supported by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Germany (EED) and Mission One World (Bavarian Lutheran Church).
In 1986 the long-term cooperation with the Medical Mission Institute Wurzburg was started by regular consultancies focusing on appropriate technology and standards by the work support of Dr. Bernhard Koehler, followed by the cooperation with the German Institute for Medical Mission –Difaem, Tubingen in 1989.
In 1991, the base of the project moved from Machame Lutheran hospital to its present location within the Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Centre (KCMC) compounds with sufficient space for additional activities and to pilot new programmes for expansion following the decision made by the ELCT-IUP Board to plan for the establishment of training and service center in Moshi, and provision of land by the Good Samaritan Foundation of Tanzania (GSF).
The ELCT-IUP was then transformed into Saint Luke Foundation (SLF) as a Trust of the ELCT in Tanzania in 2004 and registered in April 2005 with Dr. Georg Kamm as the first Executive Director and Bishop Dr. Erasto N. Kweka as the first Chairperson and Founding Trustees to secure a legal framework to govern the Infusion Units Programme (IUP) and Kilimanjaro School of Pharmacy (KSP).