SIHI Uganda at Makerere University

We provide multi-sectoral expertise on social innovation in health and connect actors in order to advance community-based solutions for improving health outcomes in Uganda.

OUR FOCUS

SIHI Uganda was launched in 2017. We are based at Makerere University School of Public Health (MakSPH) and we are partnering with the Ministry of Health and other key health organisations in Uganda. Our mission is to support accessible, equitable and affordable health care delivery for all Ugandans through social innovation.

Our focus areas are:

OUR ACTIVITIES

CASE STUDY RESEARCH

IRB Approved

Evaluation of the Kolonyi Hospital Community Health Financing Scheme on Out-of-Pocket Payments, Financial Protection, and Healthcare Utilisation in Rural Uganda.

Data collection for this study has been completed, and the data is being analysed.

Under IRB Review

A Qualitative Exploration of the Psychosocial and Empowerment Pathways in the Zoe Girls’ Health Initiative in Busoga, Uganda.

This study has received provisional approval. Preparations for data collection are ongoing while awaiting final approval.

Advocacy

Conducted a Regional Dissemination workshop in the Eastern region on 17 April 2026. Region-based stakeholders, including District Health Officers, Chief Administrative Officers, and Mayors, attended the dissemination. Innovators presented their work through plenary and poster sessions.

Conducted monthly webinars for the SIHI Uganda Community of Practice. The webinars included

How to establish strategic partnerships for our innovations (April)
Branding and dissemination of community health innovations (May), and one is scheduled for the end of June

SIHI Uganda Poster Session at the Regional Dissemination, 17 April 2026

CAPACITY BUILDING FELLOWSHIP PROGRAM

Conducted the third workshop for the fellowship, focusing on Effective Communication and Fundraising, and Environmental and Social Impact Assessment. It was held on 13-16 April 2026, at Mbale Courts View Hotel. This was the final workshop for the current cohort of innovators.

Conducted site visits to new small grant recipients to provide grant implementation support. The organisations visited were:

Zoe Girls Initiative
Amani Uganda
FACES
POWER
Busoga Health Forum

Four organisations have since received grants.

SIHI Uganda Third Workshop, Mbale Courts View Hotel, 13th to 16th of April 2026

Selection of Innovators

For Q4 2025: Following a call for new innovators based in Eastern Uganda, twenty-nine applications were received. Twelve innovations were successfully selected and joined the six-month modular fellowship.

Workshop 1 on Effective Project Management and Entrepreneurship Modules

The SIHI Uganda Program at Makerere University School of Public Health conducted its first Social Innovation Capacity-Building Fellowship workshop (3–7 November 2025) in Mbale, engaging 25 participants from 12 community-based health innovations in Eastern Uganda. The workshop strengthened skills in project management, monitoring and evaluation, and entrepreneurship, with teams producing key planning and business tools. Learning assessments showed improved knowledge and high participant satisfaction. The workshop effectively enhanced the capacity of community innovators to design, manage, and sustain locally driven health solutions in Uganda.

Publications

Epidemiological and socioeconomic insights for jiggers control from a community-driven social innovation project in Eastern Uganda. Isabirye, A., Ahumuza, E., Nanyeenya, N. et al. Epidemiological and socioeconomic insights for jiggers control from a community-driven social innovation project in Eastern Uganda. Discov Public Health 22, 763 (2025)

Small Grants

In Q4 2025, following the call for small grants that was issued in the previous quarter, four organisations were identified to receive small subject to meeting all granting conditions. Kyaninga Child Development Organisation was successfully contracted in December 2025. The project aims to provide therapy, rehabilitation, and education to children with disabilities (CwDs) and their caregivers, while ensuring access to appropriate assistive devices for identified children. Contracting other groups is ongoing.

Community of Practice

Monthly webinars were conducted as part of the SIHI/Uganda community of practice (COP). The COP is composed of past and present innovators. The topics were as follows:

December 2025
Topic: Entrepreneurship Skills: A key to sustainable community health innovations.
Presenter: Dr Kassimu Sendawula from College of Business, Makerere University

November 2025
Topic: Strengthening Parenting for Improved Health and Family Relations – A case study from Change Development Initiatives (CDI)
Presenter: Mr. Leo Turyahebwa, Programs Director, CDI

October 2025
Topic: From Maps to Impact: Using Community Mapping for Better Health Innovations
Presenter: Dr Nicholus Nanyeenya, Makerere University School of Public Health

SIDA visits to see the impact of the SIHI program

SIDA, accompanied by the Ugandan SIHI team, visited two of the community innovators that were trained through the fellowship program and later supported through the small grants program to assess the impact of the SIHI program. Among the social innovators visited were Alliance for Women Advocating for Change (AWAC) and Action 4 Health Uganda (A4HU) on the 15th and 16th of December 2025, respectively. The SIDA team was impressed by the stories of the social innovators on how they had benefited from the fellowship training, and later on the catalytic small grant funding which has enhanced their social innovations.

Innovation identification call

In May 2024, we launched an open call for community-based solutions aimed at improving health and sexual and reproductive health in Uganda. The call targeted organisations and individuals with innovative solutions implemented for at least two years. The call was promoted through the SIHI and Makerere University School of Public Health websites. A total of 31 submissions were received, with 27 eligible for review. The independent panel conducted the review in July and August, announcing the top four solutions in August 2024.

MAKERERE UNIVERSITY SOCIAL INNOVATION IN HEALTH FELLOWSHIP PROGRAM

We have a capacity building fellowship program for health innovators, which is a modular, six-month distance learning program that features three face-to-face workshops and continuous online support. This fellowship program began in September 2023 and ended in March 2024. It aimed to equip participants with innovation, effective project management, research, environmental assessment, communication and fundraising skills.

We held three 4-day face-to-face workshops at Makerere University Resilient African Network (RAN) in Kampala, Uganda. After the workshops, the participants leveraged their learning by designing and implementing strategies aimed at enhancing social and health contributions and business competitiveness. Twenty-four fellows from 12 health projects participated in the fellowship.

PARTNERSHIP BUILDING

The team attended a national-level convener hosted by the Uganda Response Innovation Lab (U-RIL) at Save the Children. SIHI Uganda had a booth at the event to give information on the work undertaken. The convener focused on advancing innovative financing approaches within Uganda’s refugee response.
This interactive session brought together stakeholders from government, humanitarian and development organisations, donors, private sector actors, and financial institutions to:
-Build a shared understanding of innovative financing approaches

Identify policy and ecosystem enablers for scaling solutions
Explore collaboration and co-investment opportunities
Strengthen learning and coordination across the ecosystem.

Through this meeting, we were able to establish a partnership with a few organisations, including TechBuzz.

Gender Case study research

The SIHI Uganda hub is implementing a gender and social innovation project to understand and explore the gendered dimensions of social innovation in health at community level. We are working with 5 health projects which were identified through previous open calls. \n\nIn September 2022, we conducted field visits to 3 health projects and did interviews with innovators and beneficiaries. In October 2022, we conducted telephone interviews with the innovators and beneficiaries of 2 social innovation projects. The team has so far written 4 gender case study reports.

In September 2022, we conducted field visits to 3 health projects and did interviews with innovators and beneficiaries. In October 2022, we conducted telephone interviews with the innovators and beneficiaries of 2 social innovation projects. The team has so far written 4 gender case study reports.

SOCIAL INNOVATION LITERATURE REVIEW

We reviewed published literature for examples of social innovation in health by searching PubMed and Google Scholar. 743-full text articles were reviewed. 23-articles were selected and of these 8 met the inclusion criteria.

Learn more about our review and download references for identified articles.

Fundraising

In order to ensure sustainability of the social innovation activities in Uganda, we sought support through funding applications and partnership engagement. We are mapping the social innovation ecosystem in Uganda to identify possible funders of social innovation where we can submit grant applications.

FOSTERING PARTNERSHIPS: Stakeholders' Workshop

On 28th April 2022, we held the 4th social innovation stakeholders’ workshop at the Golden Tulip Hotel in Kampala, Uganda. The objectives of the workshop were: a) to show case examples of social innovation in health in Uganda; b) to introduce innovators to activities on gender and social innovation in health. The workshop convened innovators, officials from the Ministry of Health, Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development, Secretariat of Science, Technology and Innovation, academia from Makerere University, SIHI partners and other stakeholders. Read our report

Promoting Research in Social Innovation

On 17th March 2021, we organised a dissemination workshop for the top community-based health innovations that were identified in April and September 2020. During the workshop, Dr. Maxwell Otim, Science, Technology and Innovation director at MoSTI expressed interest to partner with SIHI Uganda to develop the National Social Innovation Cluster Programme.

TDR Grant on Community Engagement in Research and in Social Innovation in Health

On 18th May 2022, we participated in the TDR grantee network research update meeting. We made a presentation highlighting preliminary findings, best practices and insights regarding challenges encountered and ways forward. Since July 2021, we have been implementing a study titled “Community Engagement in Social Innovation: A Mixed Methods Analysis from the Social Innovation in Health Initiative.”

Collaborative Study on the Private Sector's Role in Providing Healthcare for Women and Children in United Republic of Tanzania and Ghana

UNICEF/ UNDP’S “Think Big Think Challenge” award, a collaborative study between SIHI/ TDR, SIHI Uganda, UNICEF and UNDP on the role of the private sector in healthcare delivery in low-and-middle-income countries (LMICs), has been completed in the United Republic of Tanzania and Ghana. It provides insights into how private sector engagement and interactions could be enhanced in order to improve the quality of healthcare for women and children. Fore more information about Big Think, read the full story here.

Gender and Social Innovation Project

We implemented a gender and social innovation project, which aims to understand and explore the gendered dimensions of social innovation in health at the community level. The hub is working with the five social innovation projects which were identified through previous calls from 2017-2021. Among the project’s specific objectives are to understand and explore the gendered aspects and dimensions of communitybased health projects, assess and identify gender monitoring indicators relevant in social innovation projects, and draw evidence-based lessons and good practices to address inequities resulting from the intersections of gender with other social stratifies in social innovation projects.

Collecting data on gender related indicators

On 25th and 28th of October 2022, the SIHI Uganda team conducted an online training (Zoom) with the innovators of social innovations. This aimed at facilitating collection of data on gender related indicators. During the training, the innovators were taken through the data collection tool, selection procedures and ethical considerations to adhere during data collection process.

On 1st October 2022, the data collection exercise started and is expected to be completed by 31st December 2022. The innovators are conducting face-to-face interviews with the beneficiaries.

"The Global Health Network Conference, “Enabling Health Research in Every Healthcare Setting”, 24-25 November 2022, in Cape Town, South Africa. "

The Director of SIHI Uganda hub, Dr. Phyllis Awor had a poster presentation during the Global Health Network Conference, “Enabling Health Research in Every Healthcare Setting”, 24-25 November 2022, in Cape Town, South Africa.

Title of the abstract, “Community Engagement in Social Innovation: A mixed methods analysis of 40 case studies from the Social Innovation in Health Initiative”

Social innovations in health in Uganda

Aware

Bwindi Mothers’ Waiting Hostel

Drug Shop Integrated Management of Childhood Illness

Healthy Child Uganda’s MamaToto Approach

Imaging the World, Africa

Ishaka Health Plan Community-based Health Insurance Scheme

Kyaninga Child Development Centre

Living Goods

My Pregnancy Handbook

Social, Emotional, and Economic Empowerment Through Knowledge of Group Support Psychotherapy (SEEK-GSP) Project, Uganda

Sole Hope—Ensuring Zero Jiggers

The Medical Concierge Group LTD

ABOUT US

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Phyllis (MD,PhD) is a medical doctor and a public health specialist. She has over 10 years of experience conducting health systems and operational research. Her research has focused on: improving both the public and private health sector in low income settings; quality of care for children in rural communities; maternal and child health policy analysis; and social innovation in health care. Phyllis led an innovative introduction of the WHO/UNICEF supported integrated Community Case Management (iCCM) of malaria, pneumonia and diarrhoea strategy within drug shops in Uganda from 2010 – 2017, which earned her an award for professional performance in public health and sustainable development.

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Freddie has over 15 years of experience working in medical/health research and policy and is an associate professor of health policy and systems management at Makerere University School of Public Health. He has extensive experience in policy related research and policy engagements in areas including: health service provision, health sector governance and financing, health system performance and health policies and innovations that straddle these aspects in Uganda and similar developing countries. Freddie has provided technical services to WHO, DFID, USAID, World Bank, Ministry of Health, Uganda AIDS Commission and multi-lateral and bilateral agencies and foundations. He serves on the Sector Monitoring, Evaluation and Research Working Group of the Ministry of Health in Uganda and on the governing board of Health Systems Global – a professional association of practitioners of health systems and policy research.

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Christine is a lecturer in the Department of Community Health and Behavioural Sciences. She holds a PhD, Masters of Public Health and Bachelor of Dental Surgery. Christine is a qualified public health specialist and researcher with considerable experience in use of both quantitative and qualitative research methods in implementation of research projects for the last twelve years. The areas of interest include maternal and child health, community health and health policy research. She has been involved in research projects as principal investigator at the School of Public health, including evaluating last mile medicines transportation by Ministry of Health Uganda, evaluating compliance to community newborn referrals in eastern Uganda and assessing introduction of newborn care services in the integrated community case management program in Uganda.