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Holy Family Rehabilitation Centre
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Centre’s history
The Holy Family Rehabilitation Centre was established in 1986 by the Brothers of Hospitaller Order of St. John of God. The centre is committed to providing holistic rehabilitation services through quality health care, and social and education support to the surrounding communities. It provides in-patient and out-patient services to both adults and children with varying orthopaedic and neurological conditions as well as providing services to children with intellectual, physical and sensory disabilities. The centre has a multidisciplinary team of professionals, from the education, social, physiotherapy, orthotics, nursing and medical care disciplines.
The centre began its Community-Based Rehabilitation (CBR) initiative in 1999. It then became dormant but was revived in 2014 and provides CBR services in the community in line with government policy and World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines. It partners with the government, national and international non-governmental organisations and interested parties from the private sector.
Within the centre is a Child Development Centre, which caters for the needs of children with physical and intellectual disabilities. It also provides home-based services to children with disabilities under three years of age and assists their parents through income-generating activities.
Working with NAD and the inclusive education teacher training programme
In 2009, NAD and NFU-Zambia began working in Lusaka, the Copper Belt and Southern Province, mapping, and identifying NGOs, DPOs and Government Departments which worked with people with disabilities.
In 2012, in addition to its focus on working with DPOs at national level from Lusaka, NAD-Zambia decided to initiate a joint CBR programme in partnership with social sector ministries of government (mainly Education, Health and Community Development and Social Welfare) in Southern Province, and one of the DPOs identified as a partner was the Holy Family Rehabilitation Centre in Monze. The inclusive education teacher training programme is linked directly to the centre because one of the programme’s Observers works there as coordinator, CBR Programme. Also, a Principal Trainer previously worked there, at their inclusive school.
The centre is the only recognised assessment centre in Southern Province, and the nearby Zimba District’s pilot schools – Luyaba and Nakowa; Riverview and Katapazi schools in Kazungula; and Shungu and Nakatindi schools in Livingstone – all send learners with additional needs to the centre to be assessed. This is the nearest assessment centre, as others are all based in Lusaka, more than 400 kilometres away from the schools.
The centre used to run a special school, but following the inclusive education training programme – and the presence of a Principal Trainer and an Observer in the centre – the school become an inclusive school, and learners without disabilities now attend alongside their peers with disabilities.
The photos below show what the centre looks like:
