Nabin Oli - KKV’s September ‘Āina Warrior

KKVʻs own Nabin Oli was recognized as a Community Health Center Champion by the Association of Asian Pacific Community Health Organizations (AAPCHO) for 2022. The award shines a spotlight on Community Healthcare Workers whose contributions help to achieve the goal of providing comprehensive, affordable, and culturally and linguistically appropriate health care to their communities. Nabin serves as a Care Coordinator/community health worker and navigator at the Towers at Kūhio Park Ke Ola Hou Health Clinic, where he assists the team five days a week with a myriad of patient needs, from medical help, case management, housing assistance, or acquiring a healthy meal to eat. He describes this role as a bridge builder to the care that people need.

Although Nabin has provided care services to Pacific island communities for over 16 years, his story began thousands of miles away in a rural village in Nepal. The first born of six children, he worked hard to succeed in school, and opted for the medical field when he saw people in his community and in his family suffering daily from a lack of basic medical care. From that moment, he pursued a dream of becoming a medical doctor and through determination and grit, secured a spot for a national government scholarship at one of the top medical schools in the country. After seven years of training in Family Medicine, his first post was in a rural village in Nepal where he could serve and give back to the communities where he came from.

Following his medical training in Nepal, Nabin accepted a position as a Primary Care Physician in the Marshall Islands, a place he had to look up on the world map. He spent the next 10 years hopping between islands, providing care to communities in great need. During his time there, he immersed himself in the culture and learned to speak Marshallese, an invaluable skill in his current role at KKV. Nabin, with his wife and first child of three, then made the move to Hawaiʻi to pursue new opportunities. He landed at KKV with much experience, but without the formal licenses required to practice medicine in the United States. Undeterred, he obtained a BS in Nursing, and will soon graduate with a Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) degree. Nabin may still pursue his passion for Family Medicine as a physician but is open to whatever the world may hold for him. He grounds himself in the simple act of doing what he loves.  

For Nabin, people are a community's greatest assets, and he treasures each interaction deeply. “We have one small life to live, and you never know what a great impact your small actions can have on someone else. So I focus on what I can do to help and how I can help a client feel healthy,” he says. It's easy to see how Nabin builds trust, through his warm personality, radiant smile, and gift for listening and being present in this moment. He has a passion for making lasting connections and empowering individuals to lead their own journeys in health care.