Leading the Fight Against Rheumatic Heart Disease (RHD) in Sub-Saharan Africa
Launched August 2026
Leading the Fight Against Rheumatic Heart Disease (RHD) in Sub-Saharan Africa
Launched August 2026
Faith Aid is leading the fight against rheumatic heart disease in Sub-Saharan Africa through HEAL Every Heart.
RHD kills impoverished children and young mothers by the hundreds of thousands each year. In Kenya, we know many of them by name as we walk alongside them. This initiative exists to change that.
HEAL — Health Access for the Least — is Faith Aid's grant and partnership program for helping impoverished patients access medical care at Christian mission hospitals in Kenya. When families cannot afford life-saving care, HEAL closes the gap between what they have and what they need.
Learn about the HEAL program
HEAL Every Heart is a dedicated initiative within the HEAL program focused entirely on rheumatic heart disease. It funds valve surgeries and cardiac care at the Tenwek Cardiothoracic Centre for patients who cannot afford treatment — giving impoverished children and young mothers a second chance at life.
The Situation
1
Valve surgery stops the damage and gives a child back his or her strength, schooling, and a normal span of years.
2
Tenwek's Cardiothoracic Centre (CTC) operates every week, and complex acquired disease is close to half its cardiac volume.
3
Families give what they have and the government helps cover part of the bill. For the most vulnerable patients, a gap remains, and HEAL Every Heart closes it.
About Rheumatic Heart Disease
In communities without reliable access to antibiotics, strep throat goes untreated. The immune system attacks the heart, destroying its valves over years of repeated inflammation. Many patients go undiagnosed until pregnancy, when RHD becomes the primary cause of maternal cardiac death. In much of Sub-Saharan Africa, valve surgery is simply out of reach.
Rheumatic heart disease is treatable — but for an impoverished patient, it is often fatal.
Where Surgery Happens
The Tenwek Cardiothoracic Center (CTC) is a center of excellence in cardiothoracic care — one of the few facilities in Sub-Saharan Africa capable of performing open-heart surgery for patients with rheumatic heart disease.
Equipped with a dedicated cardiac operating theater, intensive care unit, and a skilled team of surgeons, cardiologists, and nurses, the CTC exists to bring life-saving cardiac surgery to patients who would otherwise have no access to it.
For many patients in Sub-Saharan Africa with RHD, the Tenwek CTC is not just a hospital — it is the only place in the world where their lives can be saved.
Learn more about the Tenwek CTC55M
People living with RHD
Worldwide, concentrated in low-income countries
360K
Deaths each year
Almost all of them preventable or treatable
No. 1
Acquired heart disease
In people under the age of 25
Source: World Health Organization (WHO)
Patient Spotlight
Brian was ten when the fatigue and dizziness started in 2024. Once an active boy, he could no longer walk short distances without becoming exhausted. He was referred to Tenwek, where doctors diagnosed rheumatic heart disease requiring urgent surgery.
What weighed most heavily on his parents was how they would afford treatment. Brian's father survives on casual jobs and his mother is a small-scale farmer. When surgery was finally scheduled in early 2026, HEAL Every Heart made it possible.
Brian's surgery was successful, and he returned home to recover.
"It is hard to put into words what Faith Aid has done for our family. You gave our son a second chance at life when we had no way forward. We are forever grateful."
Lives Saved
RHD · Tenwek CTC · Oct 2026
When Felix was diagnosed with RHD at 15, his family gave everything they had trying to access care — his father Anthony sold his cows and part of the family land. By 2026, Felix urgently needed surgery at the Tenwek CTC, but there was nothing left. HEAL Every Heart made it possible.
"We were held by faith, but we were almost giving up. It is here at Tenwek that our son found healing."
RHD · Tenwek CTC · Oct 2026
Rose's family thought she had pneumonia when she first became ill in 2025. By February 2026, doctors at Tenwek diagnosed her with RHD. As her condition worsened and surgery became necessary, her parents — small-scale farmers — could not afford treatment.
"I was almost giving up. We did not even have money for clinic check-ups."
RHD · Tenwek CTC · Oct 2026
Diagnosed at age 7, Millicent spent over 10 years moving from hospital to hospital in search of healing. At 18, she finally received the surgery she needed at Tenwek Hospital — but her family, who had given everything to find her care, could not afford the treatment. HEAL Every Heart lifted the burden.
"I came here with my daughter crying, and now I am smiling."
Give
Your gift helps cover the cost of life-saving heart surgery, follow-up care, and medications for impoverished patients who would otherwise have no way forward.
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Give
Your gift helps cover the cost of life-saving heart surgery, follow-up care, and medications for impoverished patients who would otherwise have no way forward.