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Inside a Small Clinic where Music, Machines, and a Leap of Faith are Changing Lives
By Kinya Kaunjuga
Sound has captivated humans since the beginning of time. A handful of notes, and the atmosphere changes as if air was holding its breath. An elevator—just a container plunging down a shaft—becomes a lullaby ride once the doors close and music begins. The whine of a dentist’s drill is softened by music floating from ceiling speakers. A tiny clinic tucked in a slum hums with piano music, calming patients who have grown used to the hard thud of daily survival. Because healing isn’t only about medicine, but how it’s delivered.
Inside Nexicare Medical Clinic, a narrow storefront nestled deep in an informal settlement, I met the man behind a quiet surge in patient numbers. Richard Gitonga, like many others I visit in my work, runs a clinic that uses BandaGo, our health information system.
What I didn’t expect was that Richard wasn’t a clinical officer, he was a lab technician. And not just any technician. He was the kind who had seen an opening no one else had dared to squeeze through.
While others waited for better days, Richard took out a loan and bought equipment that most small clinics could only dream of. A centrifuge. A chemistry analyzer. Precision instruments that could perform tests usually referred to larger hospitals kilometers away. He took a risk that many in his shoes would have considered reckless. And it worked.
With the new lab feature in BandaGo, Richard can now enter test results into the system, and the clinical officers see them immediately—right from their computers—while sitting one-on-one with the patient in the privacy of their consulting room.
There’s something deeply human about that moment: when a caregiver and patient sit side by side, both looking at the same screen, the same data, the same story unfolding. No confusion. No wondering where the file is. Just clarity. Trust.
Nexicare began using BandaGo in September 2022, but when the full throttle lab feature was rolled out in April 2025, Richard was thrilled. Diagnostics were his terrain—his first language. As word got out about the lab tests available in the clinic in their neighborhood, patients poured in. And by the time I met him, he was just weeks away from completing his final loan payment. Every machine in that lab was now fully his and he had hired a second clinical officer to treat the rising number of patients.
Richard is also a church deacon who plays a piano in his clinic, which somehow didn’t surprise me. There’s something quietly faithful about the way he’s built Nexicare—both a clinic and a bet on the dignity of his community. The lab feature doesn’t just help him run tests. It allows him to turn data into dialogue—conversations rooted in real numbers, real science, and real hope. And his piano playing ensures its a place where lab results arrive as swiftly as the next song!
$5000 helps us get BandaGo software into one more clinic
We’re working toward a future where no one is out of reach—where a medical clinic no bigger than a corner shop can offer the kind of care once found only in distant, well-resourced places. Integrating an AI-assisted clinical decision support tool is the next critical step as soon as funds are available. This will put doctor-level diagnosis and treatment in the hands of the non-physicians who treat communities without access to doctors.
Every step forward is possible because of your support.
Thank you for your giving. We simply couldn’t do it without you!
Kinya Kaunjuga
Kinya, our corporate storyteller, is an Aggie, and has lived and worked in Africa, Asia and North America. She’s met people from almost every part of the world and believes everybody has a story worth listening to