Year Joined MKLM: 2008 Country: Kenya City: Kimini, near Kitale Focus: Healthcare, Education Project(s): Kimin Cottage Hospital, Physician Assistant People Served: A community of 1000,000 people Project Goal(s): To care for the health needs of the poor and vulnerable people in Kiminini, Kenya, as well as being a presence of Christ’s love for all his people.

Personal Data
Kathleen came to MKLM from Monmouth Beach, New Jersey. In her home parish, Church of the Precious Blood in the diocese of Trenton, New Jersey, Kathleen served as a Cantor, a Eucharist Minister, and a church choir member. Kathleen’s talents have complimented a number of semi-professional choirs spanning from as far north as New York City to as far south as Florida, and east to Bermuda, where she lived for 15 years. There, in addition to volunteering for cafeteria duty at her children’s school, Kathleen offered her time to the Bermuda Cancer Society. As a New Jersey resident, she volunteered for Mother Teresa organization.

Kathleen is a graduate of Cornell University Medical College, New York City, where she earned her certification as a Physician Assistant. When she felt her call to mission, she knew she would use her skills and experience in that field to help people overseas, particularly in Africa
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Current Ministry
Kiminini Cottage Hospital houses just 33 beds to serve a community of greater than 100,000. As is true in the whole of its parent country of Kenya, Kiminini’s people are poor, incomprehensibly poor. Wars and ailments — ones that are often no more than a minor nuisance in the western world — take the lives of hundreds of scores of men, women, and children indiscriminately. AIDS is prevalent in the area and presents an open gateway for other opertunistic diseases.

 It is in Kiminini that Kathleen wished to be. “We shall be His witnesses,” she says of her ministry as a Physician Assistant at Kiminini Cottage. (Her actual title is Clinical Officer, a British equivalent for the same job description, and which reflects the long history of British occupation of the area).

 With a shortage of health facilities and health workers, little Kiminini Cottage must carry the load of a giant, acting as an outpatient, inpatient, laboratory, antenatal, maternity services, and child health care clinic.  Kiminini Cottage is under auspices of the Bishop of the Diocese of Kitale and its staff members work closely with the Bishop and his staff members. Until Kathleen’s arrival,  Dr. Susan Nagele, a 25-year MKLM missioner, was the only doctor at the facility. Her work is transitioning to Kathleen’s ministry as she, Sue, moves to head up another facility in Mombasa.

“I want two things,” Kathleen says. “First, I want to give good quality healthcare with the greatest respect for the Kiminini people’s dignity. And, second, I want to reflect Christ’s presence in a ministry that heals not only physically, but emotionally and spiritually.” 

“Well – I’d also like my Kiswahili to improve!”.