The Global Child Health Program has established and coordinates mutually beneficial, medical education and research partnerships with pediatric hospitals and departments in resource-limited countries. The main goal of the partnerships is to help meet the self-identified medical education, research and clinical needs of the health care professionals and researchers at the partner institutions so as to build local capacity and achieve sustained improvements in the health of the children in their communities.
Picture: Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Kigali (CHUK) Chief of Pediatrics Dr. Lisine Tuyisenge and staff with McGill Global Child Health Program Co-Director Dr. Jennifer Turnbull.
Rwanda
In February 2014, the Global Child Health Program facilitated the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between the McGill Department of Pediatrics and the Department of Pediatrics of the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Kigali (CHUK) in Rwanda to form a partnership in medical education and research. Dr. Lisine Tuyisenge, the Chief of the Department of Pediatrics at CHUK, visited the MCH in July 2014 to solidify this partnership and identify areas of potential collaboration. The partnership entails bilateral exchanges of staff pediatricians, senior residents, nurses and allied health professionals, and will make use of telemedicine to facilitate regular bilateral medical education rounds and research collaboration communications.
Haiti
In September 2011, the members of the Global Child Health Initiative Steering Committee entered into a partnership with Hôpital Sainte-Justine (HSJ) to help carry out the Canadian Red Cross’ Programme intégré de santé Haïti. The mandate of this program is to improve the health of women and children in the Département du sud-est through training of local health care personnel. An initial field visit was conducted in 2012, and our program has been involved with helping to coordinate the pediatric trainings for health care professionals in the region. Trainings in malnutrition and neonatology have since been carried out.