Selian History

Selian Lutheran Hospital is a semi-urban hospital of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Tanzania - Diocese in Arusha Region (ELCT-DAR). It is located near the village of Ngaramtoni within the Arumeru District of the Arusha Region. The health work of the hospital was begun in the 1950's and has grown from a dispensary with a single building and ten beds into a 120 bed, full-service hospital offering outpatient and inpatient services including medicine, pediatric, general and specialty surgical, obstetric, maternal and child health, hospice and orphan care.

Selian Lutheran Hospital serves an immediate catchment area consisting mainly of a government ward with a population of approximately 200,000 people. The hospital and its clinic, the Arusha Town Clinic, also serve as the main referral resources for the entire urban area of Arusha, a catchment area of over a million people.

The area served by Selian Lutheran Hospital is inhabited by people of the Maasai and Waarusha tribes. Most are small scale land holders who are subsistence farmers. Foodstuffs as well as coffee are the major crops. The climate is temperate year around, rainfall is usually plentiful, and the elevation is approximately 1,500 meters.

Mt. Meru from the southwest and Maasai farmland, part of Selian's catchment area.

Selian Lutheran Hospital and the Arusha Town Clinic currently serve 50,000 outpatients annually. They do this at a cost to the patient of approximately $3 per outpatient visit. One day as an inpatient costs approximately five dollars and includes laboratory tests and medicine. Most patients come to the hospital with infectious and tropical diseases or with surgical emergencies. Malaria, AIDS, TB and pneumonia account for a high percentage of medical admissions. Trauma and acute abdominal surgery are the majority of surgical admissions.

While Selian Lutheran Hospital has been developing its reputation as the premier center for quality care in northern Tanzania, it is challenged by dramatic economic realities: Tanzania is one of the 10 poorest countries in the world. People have little and even the inexpensive medical care delivered by Selian is often unaffordable. Tanzanian government expenditure on health is less than $2 per capita annually.

With the recent opening of The Arusha Lutheran Medical Centre in December 2008, the diocese entered an agreement with the Ministry of Health to transfer Selian to the government system. As of January 2009, Selian is one of two District Hospitals in Arusha.