I am a 3rd year MFM Fellow. I plan to travel with the Maimonides Medical Center Ob/Gyn Global Health program to West Pokot, Kenya in January 2023. While there, I will be performing dating sonograms, assessment of fetal growth, anatomy, cardiac conditions, and teaching local healthcare providers to use a portable ultrasound device.
Pregnant patients in West Pokot, Kenya, which is a resource-poor, rural area with a high degree of healthcare needs.
I plan to perform about 20 sonogram assessments per day, in addition to a variety of other obstetrical procedures (complex deliveries, surgical birth, cesarean hysterectomy). I also plan to share my skills and teach local healthcare providers how to respond to obstetrical emergencies within the limitations of the local resources.
This trip was a primarily Obstetrics trip to Kapenguria and surrounding rural villages, which are located in West Pokot county, in Kenya. This county is one of the most under-served in the country with some of the poorest maternal-child health outcomes, particularly in the rates of preventable maternal and per-natal deaths. Part of the root-cause of this morbidity and mortality is the inability to effectively and reliably date pregnancies. This increases the risk of stillbirth as pregnancies can extend to dangerously late gestational ages without patients or providers realizing. Also, aside from rudimentary auscultation measures, there is limited ability to assess for fetal distress in rural health centers. The main people impacted by our trip, which was primarily focused on delivering portable ultrasound devices and training local health center workers to use them for basic assessment, would be the patients living outside the direct catchment area of the Kapenguria referral hospital.
