Paediatric Anaesthesia Training in Africa (PATA)
The Need
- 1.7 billion children lack access to safe surgery and anaesthesia. Nowhere is this problem more pressing than in Africa.
- By 2050, Africa will be home to 1 billion children under 18: 40% of the world’s child population.
- It is predicted that 85% of African children will require treatment for a surgical condition before adulthood.
- Alarmingly, it is reported that children undergoing surgery in Africa have a perioperative mortality rate 100 times higher than in high-income countries. Many countries in Africa do not have any fellowship-trained paediatric anaesthesiologists.
Background
In 2018, in partnership with the WFSA, the Paediatric Anaesthesia Training in Africa (PATA) Collaboration was established to improve the quality of paediatric anaesthesia training in Africa. Previously, the University of Nairobi in Kenya was Africa’s only 12-month paediatric anaesthesia fellowship programme.
The PATA leadership team currently represents eight African countries, ensuring that PATA’s efforts are ingrained into the African educational ecosystem. PATA’s initial objective is to expand paediatric anaesthesia fellowship opportunities for anaesthesiologists in Africa to develop more African leader-educators in paediatric anaesthesia.
Before PATA, the University of Nairobi graduated 2-3 fellows yearly. With the establishment of the PATA Collaboration, there are now three additional paediatric anaesthesia fellowship partners/sites: the Association of Anesthesiologists of Uganda (PATA-Uganda), National Hospital Abuja (PATA-Nigeria), and the University of Zambia (PATA-Zambia).
In the first two years of these new programmes, 14 additional fellows have graduated, representing a 200% increase in paediatric anaesthesiology fellows graduating yearly.
Paediatric Anaesthesia Fellowship Impact
The PATA programme will significantly shift the landscape for paediatric anaesthesia and surgery in Africa over the coming years.
We estimate that the graduates trained during the programme’s first five years alone will directly care for over 1.2 million children throughout their careers. Many millions more children will benefit from the trickle-down effect of having paediatric anaesthesia experts as leaders and educators in their countries.
To date, all the PATA graduates have remained in their home countries to practice. Many have taken on leadership and education roles within their institutions, training residents and non-physician anaesthesia providers to better care for complex paediatric patients and neonates.
Investment
We have received generous support from various organizations and individuals to develop these new paediatric anaesthesia fellowship programmes. Most recently, grant funding from Smile Train and The ELMA Foundation has allowed us to establish three new sites for PATA fellowship programmes.
In addition to programmatic support, the grant included three years of scholarship funding for young anesthesiologists to participate in these programmes. In addition, the Society for Pediatric Anesthesia continues to provide scholarship support annually, specifically for the University of Nairobi Paediatric Anaesthesia Fellowship programme.
The Ask
The WFSA/PATA paediatric anaesthesia fellowship programme is available to African anaesthesiologists interested in obtaining subspecialty training in paediatric anaesthesia, enabling them to become leaders and educators in the specialty in their home countries.
Opportunities to participate in WFSA fellowship programmes have a lasting impact on individuals’ skills and professional development and their colleagues and patients back home. We need your support to sustain PATA’s momentum. We also need to expand PATA and train more paediatric anaesthesiologists in more countries.
For more information or to get involved, please contact sara.portugal@wfsahq.org.
The PATA fellowship programme are made possible by the support of:
- The ELMA Foundation
- Smile Train
- African Mission Healthcare – Kenya
- Association of Anesthesiologists of Uganda
- Boston Children’s Hospital Global Health Program
- Ghana College of Physicians and Surgeons
- National Hospital Abuja
- Kids Operating Room
- University of Cape Town
- University of Nairobi
- University of Zambia
- Vanderbilt Institute for Global Health
- World Federation of Societies of Anaesthesiologists (WFSA)
