UNC Global Anesthesia seeks to offer educational, clinical, and research opportunities for anesthesia trainees and faculty at Kamuzu Central Hospital in Lilongwe, Malawi. The goal of the collaboration is to improve the anesthesia and critical care in Malawi through enhanced education, development of evidence-based protocols, and quality improvement research projects.
I will be working with a group of faculty from UNC to serve as a clinical supervisor and lecturer for the native anesthesia providers of the country. They receive an anesthesia focused clinical education and do not attend medical school. My role will be to help round out their anesthesia knowledge base, help implement a longitudinal anesthesia curriculum for them, and help train them in POCUS and simulation.
I will be working with a group of educators from UNC and the native Kamuzu Central Hospital to serve the surrounding community in Lilongwe, Malawi. The hospital is a large tertiary care center that serves approximately 5 million people, referred from smaller district hospitals as well as the surrounding countries. This provides accessible healthcare to vulnerable populations with nowhere else to go. I will also be organizing and teaching public health discussions and lectures to improve healthcare disparities in the community.
Our goal is to update their anesthesia practices to improve their surgical outcomes. Our overall mission is to help reduce their surgical and obstetric mortality rates and to empower them to maintain their anesthesia services without our long-term involvement. One goal that I have is to help get the current group of students hands on with quality improvement and see what simple, easy ideas can be implemented to help improve patient care and education. Our teaching and support through a long-lasting partnership will allow continued growth and learning into the future.
My global health trip to Malawi was a fantastic experience! We got to work with anesthesia providers in limited resource areas and assist with operating room care. We also provided lectures, simulation, and other educational sessions to improve critical care services in the area.
