The Candriam Institute’s “Helping Those Who Help” programme supports practical, lasting ways to improve young lives—especially where the need is greatest. Children’s rights to health, safety, and opportunity depend on the strength of local systems. That’s why the initiative backs frontline partners like the Spanish association Fundación Amigos de Monkole, which equips Monkole Hospital in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo, to equip medical teams with skills and tools that endure.
In a country where half of the 100 million inhabitants are under the age of 15[1], developing strong healthcare teams is essential to the nation’s future. Every improvement in training, communication, and care delivery at Monkole has a ripple effect — helping ensure that more children grow up healthy, supported, and ready to thrive.
Training that transforms lives
In Kinshasa, a midwife steadies a stethoscope, listening for a heartbeat she now knows how to find more confidently. Nearby, a young doctor checks an ECG rhythm with skills sharpened in recent weeks. These small moments add up to safer childhoods. Through Helping Those Who Help, the Candriam Institute supports the Fundación Amigos de Monkole and its ongoing training program at Monkole Hospital — an initiative that equips local teams with the know-how to meet Congolese health needs.
The programme pairs visiting specialists with Monkole’s staff to transfer skills that stay. In cardiology, a month-long residency deepened practical training in clinical ECG and differential diagnosis for ten Congolese general practitioners, with a second cardiologist scheduled to extend the mentorship. Knowledge transfer is designed to stay put: the emphasis is on hands-on sessions, shared protocols, and building local trainers who can cascade skills to colleagues.
Strengthening care from every angle
In maternal and newborn care, two midwife-nurses delivered a two-week course in June for Monkole staff, ISSI nursing students, and professionals from nearby centres such as Binza - spreading best practice across the local network.
This focus on women’s health extended to oncology, where a mission strengthened the existing Elikia cervical-cancer screening project. The result was that local clinicians can now run the project independently and complete all tests on site, protecting mothers and, through them, the children who rely on their care.
Beyond prevention, surgical teams also partnered with Monkole on a foot-deformity initiative that assessed 25 patients and provided corrective surgery for complex cases such as relapsed clubfoot and arthrogryposis. Alongside the work in the operating rooms, twenty local professionals joined a dedicated teaching session — developing expertise that will continue to benefit families long after visitors have left.
Hospitals don’t only run on medicine; they run on communication. In the spring, Monkole’s managers and board took part in an intensive leadership and conflict-resolution course. The aim was simple: help teams navigate pressure, align decisions, and resolve disagreements before they affect patients. Better collaboration means clearer handovers, quicker responses, and fewer delays for families waiting in crowded corridors.
Ignacio Martin-Villalba works closely with the foundation, on behalf of the Candriam Institute, and sees first-hand the effects the positive impact the training programme has on Monkole.
Educating young people is planting the seeds of the future: every skill learned today improves lives tomorrow. Projects like this remind us that at Candriam we not only focus on safeguarding our clients’ investments, but also on contributing — even in small ways — to a more conscious and responsible world. In a fast-paced society, initiatives like these invite us to pause and appreciate all that a committed community can achieve. The most demanding work is done by those who dedicate their time, knowledge, and compassion on the ground; we have the privilege of supporting them and learning from their example.
Empowering people, shaping brighter futures
On November 20th, World Children’s Day reminds us that children thrive when the people who care for them have the training, leadership, and support to do their best work. Through Helping Those Who Help and partners like Fundación Amigos de Monkole, the Candriam Institute is supporting what matters most: the people and systems that help every child grow up healthy and hopeful.
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Fundación Amigos de Monkole
[1] Source: Fundacion Amigos de Monkole