Issue Nº 01 2025 / 2026 Kigali · Working Globally

Evidence built
for the next
decade of
global health.

We are a Kigali-headquartered research and advisory firm working with governments, multilateral institutions, donors, and health-sector organisations across Africa and globally — generating the evidence that shapes how health systems are built, financed, and delivered.

Maternal & Child Health Infectious Diseases & NTDs NCDs & Eye Health Mental Health Health Security & One Health Nutrition & WASH Digital Health & Informatics Health Systems Strengthening Implementation Science Health Financing & Policy Maternal & Child Health Infectious Diseases & NTDs NCDs & Eye Health Mental Health Health Security & One Health Nutrition & WASH Digital Health & Informatics Health Systems Strengthening Implementation Science Health Financing & Policy

Across Africa and globally, health systems are facing an inflection. Rwanda's data shows why it matters.

Funding is contracting, disease patterns are flipping, and digital infrastructure is straining under demands it was never designed for. The figures below are Rwandan — but the story is global. Public Health Impact exists to help leaders navigate this moment with evidence, not improvisation.

47.7%
Of health-facility deaths in 2024 caused by non-communicable diseases — now the leading cause of death in Rwanda.
Source · NISR Vital Statistics 2024
6.6%
Share of national budget allocated to health in 2024/25 — well below the Abuja Declaration target of 15%.
Source · UNICEF Rwanda
1in 4
Insured Rwandans who actually accessed care in the past year — coverage is not utilisation.
Source · Glob Health Action 2026
$4.2B
Investment needed to deliver HSSP V (2024/25–2028/29) and reach universal coverage by 2030.
Source · MoH Rwanda, HSSP V

Four practices. One pipeline: from data and analytics, to policy action, to programmes that work.

Most firms stop at the report. We connect the chain end-to-end — generating the evidence, doing the analytics that make it decision-ready, translating it into policy action, and following through into programme design and implementation. Every engagement moves data closer to the people who can act on it.

01 / Research & Evidence
Research & Evidence Generation
Where the chain begins. Mixed-methods studies, implementation science, programme evaluations, and rapid policy briefs designed to meet peer-review standards and answer the questions decision-makers are actually asking.
  • Cost-effectiveness and burden-of-disease studies
  • Programme sustainability and impact evaluation
  • Qualitative & quantitative formative research
  • Peer-reviewed publication support
02 / Strategic Health Analytics
Strategic Health Analytics
Where data becomes decision-ready. We turn HMIS, DHIS2, registries, surveys, and routine data into the dashboards, equity-stratified analyses, and visualisations that drive policy and programme decisions. Data is infrastructure — not exhaust.
  • HMIS, DHIS2 & registry data analysis
  • Equity-stratified and geospatial analytics
  • Decision dashboards and policy-ready visualisations
  • M&E framework design and data verification
03 / Policy Action & Strategy
Policy Action & Strategy
Where analytics become action. We translate evidence into operational policy options, strategic plans, and investment cases — aligned with national priorities and global commitments — so leaders can move from data to decision quickly.
  • Policy briefs, white papers, and decision memos
  • Health sector and sub-sector strategies
  • Sustainable financing & domestic resource mobilisation
  • Investment cases for governments and donors
04 / Programme Design & Implementation
Programme Design & Implementation
Where strategy becomes delivery. We design programmes, write the grants that fund them, build the technical assistance that runs them, and train the teams that sustain them. Evidence is only valuable when it survives the rollout.
  • Programme design and grant proposal development
  • Embedded technical assistance and implementation support
  • Project charters and change-management plans
  • Research and management capacity training

Rooted in Kigali. Engaged globally.

We believe the next generation of health systems wins will not come from any single country acting alone. They will come from locally-led evidence, generated where the problems live, applied through partnerships that cross borders and sectors.

Our Vision
A world where every health policy, programme, and shilling is guided by rigorous, locally-generated evidence — and where African expertise shapes how global health systems are built.
Our Mission
To produce rigorous, actionable research and advisory services that strengthen health systems, accelerate universal health coverage, and build the next generation of evidence-led practice in Rwanda, across Africa, and globally.
001
Local, Rigorous
Kigali-led, with peer-review standards in every report we sign — and the credentials to engage globally.
002
Decision-Oriented
Evidence that lands on a desk where someone can act on it within the week.
003
Systems-Aware
We design for the full system — financing, workforce, data, governance — not single interventions.
004
Globally Engaged
Trusted by multilateral institutions, national governments, academic partners, and frontline NGOs alike.

The full breadth of public health — under one rigorous roof.

Public health rarely respects neat categories. A maternal death is also a health-financing question. An eye-care programme is also a workforce strategy. We work across the seven domains below — and the interfaces between them — because that is where most decisions actually live.

A · MNCAH & SRH

Maternal, newborn, child & adolescent health

Maternal mortality and near-miss, neonatal survival, child and adolescent health, family planning, sexual and reproductive health, respectful maternity care, and adolescent-friendly services.

B · Communicable Diseases

Infectious diseases & neglected tropical diseases

HIV, TB, malaria, viral hepatitis, vaccine-preventable diseases, and NTDs including schistosomiasis, soil-transmitted helminths, and onchocerciasis — across prevention, treatment, and elimination programming.

C · NCDs & Mental Health

Non-communicable & mental health

Cardiovascular disease, diabetes, cancer, chronic respiratory disease, mental health, and the often-overlooked NCDs — eye health and vision, oral health, hearing, and disability — that drive enormous burden in Rwanda.

D · Health Security

Health security, One Health & climate

Disease surveillance, outbreak preparedness and response, antimicrobial resistance, zoonotic and vector-borne diseases, and the health consequences of climate change — coordinated across human, animal, and environmental health.

E · Health Systems

Health systems, financing & policy

Primary care strengthening, health workforce, quality of care and IPC, health financing and CBHI sustainability, governance, and the policy work that connects all of it to Rwanda's HSSP V agenda.

F · Digital Health

Digital health & health informatics

Implementation and evaluation of digital health platforms, electronic medical records, HMIS and DHIS2 strengthening, mHealth, telemedicine, and the interoperability and data-governance foundations that make digital systems actually deliver.

G · Nutrition & Environment

Nutrition, WASH & environmental health

Child stunting and chronic malnutrition, food security and dietary risk factors, water, sanitation and hygiene, indoor air pollution, occupational health, and the environmental determinants that shape population health outcomes.

We work with the institutions shaping global health — from multilaterals to local NGOs.

Our partners span the full spectrum of health-sector actors: a UN multilateral agency, a national government, a regional academic institution, an international NGO, and Rwandan implementing organisations. We bring the same standard of work to each.

01 · Multilateral
World Health Organization

Technical assistance for global normative work in sexual and reproductive health and rights — including evidence-based implementation guidance, expert convening, and dissemination of operational tools.

UN agency · Geneva HQ
02 · Government
Ministry of Health, Rwanda

Research coordination, programme design, and digital health governance — anchored to Rwanda's Health Sector Strategic Plan V (2024–2029) and Vision 2050.

National government
03 · Academic
University of Global Health Equity

Academic collaboration on global health delivery research, training, and evidence generation — building from UGHE's mission to reshape how health is taught and practised.

University · Butaro, Rwanda
04 · International NGO
Fred Hollows Foundation

Eye health programming, research, and advocacy — contributing to the unfinished agenda of avoidable blindness and vision impairment in sub-Saharan Africa.

International NGO
05 · Local NGO
We for Health

Reproductive, maternal, newborn, child and adolescent health programming and health systems strengthening at the Rwandan facility and district level.

Local NGO · Kigali
06 · Local NGO
Heart and Sole Africa

Neglected tropical disease programming, focused on podoconiosis prevention, clinical management, and community-based care in northern Rwanda.

Local NGO · Musanze

How we move from research question to decision.

A disciplined four-stage method. Each stage produces a deliverable a client can defend, share, or act on — no theatre, no jargon walls.

01

Frame

We sit with the decision-maker to define the question, the audience, and what changes if the evidence comes back one way or the other.

02

Investigate

Mixed methods, primary and secondary data, with local field teams. We never outsource the parts that matter to validity.

03

Translate

Findings become a brief, a dashboard, a strategy document, or a manuscript — written for the person who will use it, not the person who funded it.

04

Embed

We stay through implementation: training, M&E setup, and adaptive course-correction. Evidence is only valuable when it survives the rollout.

Four audiences. One standard of work.

We work with the institutions shaping health systems — locally, regionally, and globally. We bring the same rigour to a five-page policy brief as to a multi-year evaluation.

Audience 01

Multilateral & Global Health Institutions

UN agencies, multilateral bodies, and international health institutions commissioning technical assistance, normative guidance support, and implementation research.

Audience 02

Governments & Public Institutions

Ministries of Health, regulatory agencies, and public institutions — strategic plans, evaluations, and evidence to support national priorities and global commitments.

Audience 03

Donors & Foundations

Bilateral agencies, philanthropic foundations, and impact investors who need local evidence, programme design, and credible in-country implementation support.

Audience 04

NGOs, Academia & Private Sector

Implementing partners, universities, health-tech firms, and research consortia needing rigorous research, evaluation, and evidence grounded in the contexts where care is delivered.

Our founders.

Public Health Impact is led by two Rwandan physicians and supported by a network of specialists assembled to fit the work. We scale the team to the question — locally, regionally, or globally.

— The Co-Founders
Co-Founder

Dr. Polyphile Ntihinyurwa

Clinician-Researcher

Obstetrician-Gynaecologist and Family Planning Fellow (St. Paul's Hospital Millennium Medical College, Addis Ababa), with academic appointments at the University of Rwanda's College of Medicine and Health Sciences and the University of Utah School of Medicine.

His published research spans maternal mortality, family planning and sexual wellbeing, and implementation studies in critical care and infectious disease — combining frontline clinical practice with peer-reviewed evidence generation.

Co-Founder

Dr. Christian Mazimpaka

Public Health Practitioner

Physician and Doctor of Public Health (Boston University School of Public Health, Leadership, Management & Policy), with an MSc in Global Health Delivery from the University of Global Health Equity. Former Clinical Director for Kayonza District with Partners In Health / Inshuti Mu Buzima.

His work spans primary care strengthening, integrated management of childhood illness, infection prevention and control, community health worker training, and respectful maternity care — translating district-level practice into national policy.

— The Extended Team

For every engagement we assemble a fit-for-purpose team from our roster of Rwandan and regional specialists. Across our network we bring expertise in:

01 Epidemiologists & Biostatisticians
02 Data Scientists & Analysts
03 Health Financing & Economics Experts
04 Health Policy & Systems Specialists
05 Monitoring & Evaluation Advisors
06 Qualitative Researchers
07 Digital Health & Informatics Experts
08 Implementation Scientists
09 Field Coordinators & Enumerators
10 Clinical & Programme Subject-Matter Experts
11 Communications & Knowledge Translation
12 Grant Writers & Proposal Strategists
Strong health systems are not built on donor cycles. They are built on rigorous, locally-generated evidence, sustainable financing, and the discipline to act on what the data says — even when it's inconvenient. That is true in Kigali. It is true everywhere.
— Public Health Impact, founding principle

A question worth answering?
Wherever you are, let's frame it together.

Whether you are commissioning a study, shaping a strategy, or running an evaluation — in Kigali, in a regional capital, or in Geneva — we are ready to bring the right team and the right evidence to the task. Let's begin the conversation.

Send a brief
Office
Kacyiru, Gasabo
Kigali, Rwanda