To goal of this experience is to better understand the practice of anesthesia in low resource settings, the use of techniques and medications that are otherwise not approved in the United States. I plan to work in the Intensive Care Unit in Ethiopia to understand how they manage acute life-threatening conditions. During my time in Ethiopia, I hope to learn how to communicate, interact and provide medical care to a different patient's population than the one we see in the United States.
In addition, I will be performing Clinical duties in the Operating Room as well as teaching, running morning rounds, and providing practical learning experiences to junior residents in ICU and perioperative settings. Part of the expectations also includes participating in academic enhancement programs such as seminars, conferences and lectures to both residents, and faculty while also learning the practice of anesthesia and critical care medicine in low resource clinical settings.
At the end of this project, I hope to develop skills and acquire tools that can be used in life threatening situations with minimal resources. furthermore, I hope to better understand the different clinical considerations for patients in peri-operative settings while exchanging knowledge, tools and resources that can be beneficial to me and my host program
It is my hope that this project will benefit both patients and healthcare workers.
For the patients, I will be working with patients in low resource settings in a developing country with little access to state of the art healthcare facilities. These patients also have limited financial capacity to cover surgical costs and anesthesia expenses for their surgeries. It is my hope that I can provide the manpower and workforce needed to help more patients while also rendering my clinical knowledge as a senior anesthesiology residents who is merely months to be done with training.
For Clinicians and Healthcare providers, it is my hope that I can bring several knowledge; both clinical and procedural prowess to the learners while also learning how the practice of anesthesiology is different in low resource setting like in Ethiopia. During my time there I will be hosting and leading multiple teaching experiences including but not limited to teaching, running morning rounds, and providing practical learning experiences to junior residents in ICU and perioperative settings. Examples of these teaching experiences includes how to use an ultrasound, the use of anatomical landmarks to perform procedures in the absence of an ultrasound, perioperative risk stratification for patients, operating room codes and how to handle them, performing nerve blocks etc. I believe it will be a valuable tool providing these knowledge in both surgical and anesthesia critical care settings to reduce the burden of morbidity and mortality in this population.
I identify as both African and African American. Having been born and raised in Nigeria, it has also been my utmost hope that I can go back to Africa and give back to the continent and the community who raised me to the man I have become today and I cannot think of a better way to kick start that initiative than going to Addis-Ababa especially with the phenomenal support of the Anesthesiology department at the Black Lion Hospital.
The expected impact in three-pronged, for me and my career, and my host hospital and for my home hospital.
I think there is a lot of knowledge to share with my host institution with the practice of anesthesia and critical care medicine. I hope that at the end of my time in Ethiopia, clinicians - both residents and attendings will gain a better understanding and knowledge about the practice of anesthesiology which will ultimately translate to a reduction in the burden of disease, morbidity and mortality in that population.
For my home institution, I hope that the knowledge I amass in Ethiopia will translate to useful tools and resources that I can use to help my patients especially in emergent conditions or in low resource settings like the Appalachia or the Indian reservations where we may have limited resources.
Finally for me, I hope that I can gain a deeper and better understanding about the practice of anesthesia in low resource settings and in Africa that can be useful in my future projects whether in Africa or in other parts of the world where resources may be limited or where the practice of anesthesiology may be vastly different from the United States.
