About UNC Project-Uganda

In 2004, a group of UNC physicians established the Amal Murarka International Pediatric Health Foundation in memory of their colleague, Dr. Amal Murarka, who died unexpectedly in 2003. The foundation sent a medical team to Kampala to establish the country's first pediatric intensive care unit at Mulago Hospital, Makerere University, where Dr. Murarka had previously conducted research. Subsequent work in 2007 and 2008 focused on pediatric cardiac surgery. The foundation not only built a cardiac ICU, but also performed a total of 21 life-saving pediatric cardiac surgeries.

In 2008 the foundation partnered with the Institute for Global Health and Infectious Diseases to establish UNC Project-Uganda.

Mission

The UNC Project-Uganda was established to support sustainable delivery of compassionate and competent health care to infants, children, and adolescents in Uganda; to improve the medical knowledge of the Ugandan health care workforce through in-country training and a physician exchange program; and to provide advanced medical equipment, medications, and services necessary for the delivery of compassionate and competent pediatric care in Uganda.

Monday, May 18, 2009

Repairing the heart of an 18 year-old Ugandan here in North Carolina

Cross-posted on the UNC Institute for Global Health blog.



The institute’s UNC Project-Uganda has brought an 18-year-old young man, Patrick Kahuma, to UNC Hospitals to repair a narrow heart valve. They are inserting a balloon into the vProalve to widen it. In the U.S. and other developed countries, this procedure would have been done before Patrick turned 2. Patrick has lived with this heart defect for 18 years. He had to drop out of school because he couldn’t make the 6K walk from his village to the school.

He traveled to Chapel Hill with his aunt (he is an orphan) and an interpreter. The procedure is taking place now, and IGHID is live on Twitter during the procedure.

Read more about the story here.

Posted by UNC UGANDA TEAM at 10:24 AM

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