I will be traveling to Lagos, Nigeria from 09/30/2022 – 10/09/2022 as part of the RAD-AID Nigeria team. The project is a collaborative effort between RAD-AID and IRDOCNigeria at Euracare multi-specialist hospital in Lagos Nigeria. The goal of this partnership is to build a self-sustaining Interventional Radiology training program in Nigeria. As a PGY 6 Interventional Radiology resident at Mount Sinai Hospital and the project manager for RAD-AID Nigeria, I will be joining this team to help with their goal of training the future generations of Nigerian Interventional Radiologists.
IRDOCNigeria was established in 2018 by Dr. Ninalowo, a US trained Vascular and Interventional Radiologist who completed his training at the prestigious University of Pennsylvania. Since its establishment of this practice, Dr. Ninalowo has been providing the wide range of IR procedures locally in Nigeria at the Euracare multi-specialist hospital and several other hospitals in Lagos and Abuja . Nigeria, a country of approximately 200 million people, has only 5 interventional radiologists and no IR training program. Given the lack of IR training in Nigeria, an Interventional Radiology fellowship program is being established at at the Euracare multi-specialist hospital. The program has now enrolled its first fellow committed to a two year fellowship in interventional radiology.
As a resident, I traveled to Tanzania in march 2021 with the support of the doximity grant. In continuous of my interest in expanding IR training in Africa, I am traveling to Nigeria to assist in the establishment of an IR training program in Nigeria. As the project manager for the RAD-AID Nigeria, I am spearheading the curriculum for this training program. In addition to lectures and workshops. I anticipate participating in the preoperative, intra-operative, and post-operative care of patients. Furthermore, I will also be donating medical equipment (consumables for IR procedures) as part of the trip which will help keep this program going.
This has been a long-term dream to establish an IR training program in Nigeria. This trip will serve as a great stride forward towards achieving this goal.
The visitng RAD-AID team consisted of a cardiothoracic radiologist, an IR nurse, an IR Tech, and myself (an IR Fellow). The trip began at the university college hospital (UCH) in Ibadan. Because of the visiting RAD-AID team, the residents, nurses, and techs came in on a public holiday to partake in lectures and workshops. Over several day, the lectures and workshops covered a range of topics from percutaneous management of obstructive jaundice to the continued application of AI in the Radiology department at UCH. Furthermore, I attending meetings with the hospital administrative team to advocate for continued support of the IR training program (including paying the salary of the sole IR fellow Dr. Peter, who is a junior consultant at UCH). From UCH, I went to the Euracare multi-specialist hospital in Lagos to work with the new IR fellow, Dr. Peter. Under the guidance of Dr. Ninalowo, an IR attending, we performed several cases with Dr. Peter serving as primary proceduralist when appropriate. In addition to supporting clinical duties at Euracare, I also attending the annual meeting of the Association of Radiologists in Nigeria (ARIN). At ARIN, I assisted in preparing and executing the only IR hands on workshop. The workshop allowed attendees to practice ultrasound needle guidance on phantoms and walk through the steps of great saphenous vein ablation (also utilizing phantoms). Overall the trip had the intended effect of continue to support the IR training program in Nigeria.
