Global health projects
Members of the Global Health Collaborative are active in projects around the world, from India to Sierra Leone, the Antarctic to Peru
Masanga Hospital Sierra Leone
A long-running association with Masanga Hospital in Sierra Leone means opportunities for medical students, global and remote healthcare postgraduate students and research.
Masanga UK, The University of Plymouth Peninsula Medical School and University Hospitals Plymouth NHS Trust have been in partnership with Masanga Hospital in rural Sierra Leone since 2008.
During that time we have collectively raised £600,000 and helped to facilitate the rehabilitation of the hospital following the civil war. In the last seven years, over 60 Peninsula Medical School staff and students have been placed at Masanga as part of a mutual benefit programme.
Our volunteers have gained experience in health issues of global importance, such as the Ebola crisis, and in return we have been able to provide skilled workers and funding for a number of educational projects.
Since 2014 we have received two Department for International Development grants to provide training in a number of areas, including infection prevention control and Ebola community awareness. To date we have trained over 500 community members and health care workers, using innovative educational tools and technology to improve resilience against further outbreaks of viral haemorrhagic fever.
Ebola
We have previously opened a medical admissions unit at Masanga and this year we were able to fund an isolation facility for patients with dangerous pathogens. We are also due to complete a new accommodation facility for Masanga UK and PUPSMD volunteers in 2017.
Masanga leads Austin Hunt and Thomas Gale won a large Tropical Health Education Trust (THET) grant to develop the E-Buddi system, an interactive education tool created in response to the Ebola outbreak.
Kenya Orthopaedic Project (KOP)
When Dr Lucy Obolensky met a Kenyan woman who had been crushed by an elephant and effectively maimed for life, the idea for the Kenya Orthopaedic Project/MEAK was born with vital input from healthcare professionals from Torbay Hospital.
In 2008 the World Health Organisation identified trauma as the world’s leading cause of death. In Kenya, many patients suffering trauma were not receiving effective treatment. The Kenya Orthopaedic Project was set up with the aim of improving trauma care in Kenya.
With a ratio of trained orthopaedic surgeons per head of population being 1:550,000 it is understandable that the trauma burden throughout Kenya and East Africa is high.
Even if numbers of trained surgeons reached the WHO recommendations of 1:100,000 the cost of the surgery and implants required would be prohibitive for the population who are most in need of orthopaedic care.
This has a catastrophic effect on families and societies as young, fit adults, often with young families, are unable to return to work to due to lengthy hospital stays and ongoing disability following a fracture.
KOP works collaboratively with Kenyan government hospitals to improve trauma care through side-by-side working, training and provision of equipment.
In 2012, leading KOP personnel published the results of their first five years’ work in the British Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery (now the Bone and Joint Journal):
The Kenya Orthopaedic Project: surgical outcomes of a travelling multidisciplinary team
For further information on the KOP please watch this video.
Future Health Africa
Future Health Africa is a UK-based charity which strives for sustainable improvement in the health and wellbeing of people in low-middle-income countries (LMICs). Our principle is to work where we are invited in LMICs, thereby ensuring local engagement and increasing the chances of success. Through sharing skills, we hope to transform lives, relieve suffering and reduce poverty.
Our main work started in Kenya in 2009, initiated by Dr Lucy Obolensky, who had been helping to improve access to primary healthcare for Maasai communities in Central Kenya since as far back as 1997.
Dr Lucy Obolensky and Dr Kerri Jones formed a charity to support the work in 2010, which later became Future Health Africa in 2019. By then, the charity’s work had expanded into many more areas and to other locations. To date all our work has taken place in Kenya but all our projects are transferable to other environments, in Africa or on other continents.
Global Recognition and Assessment of the Sick Patient and Initial Treatment (GRASPIT)
GRASPIT has been designed to give clinicians a structured systematic approach to the management of acutely ill deteriorating patients. It has been established in Kenya with the support of the National Resuscitation Council of Kenya.
Welcome to GRASPIT (Vimeo video)
Infection Prevention Control and Ebola Resilience Education (iCARE)
Linked to the Masanga Mentor Ebola Initiative, iCARE has seen joint working between telemedical experts at Plymouth University Peninsula Schools of Medicine and Dentistry, and healthcare professionals in the UK and Sierra Leone, to develop an app to support health workers in Sierra Leone with the fight against Ebola-related infection.