Photo: Dr. KarenBeth Bohan in Masindi, Uganda Fall 2012

For those of you who might be new to my blog, I’d like to give you a few sentences of explanation of what I’m doing and where I’m going, and why. This will be my 3rd trip to Uganda with Pharmacy Students. I’m taking 3 students this year and they will be introducing themselves on this blog over the next few days. They will be participating in a Global Health Advanced Pharmacy Practice Experiential (APPE) rotation. That is a complicated way of saying they are spending 4 weeks in Uganda as one of their clinical experiences in their last year of the Doctor of Pharmacy Program at Wilkes University. I’ve developed a partnership with several agencies in Uganda which allow us to come and help them by working in Hospitals, Clinics, and in the Community with the Masindi Red Cross. The students and I get to learn about the healthcare challenges facing the people and medical community in Uganda and in turn, we try model how pharmacists practice in the USA as we work together with other healthcare providers to improve patients’ health outcomes. We also present lectures to pharmacy students at Makerere University in Kampala to help them learn new skills and knowledge. Originally the reason I started to explore a trip to Uganda was because I was asked to help assess the water, sanitation, and hygiene education initiatives of a WASH NGO in Masindi, Uganda: The Water Trust (TWT). My first trip involved talking with small focus groups in the villages that are served by TWT about the impact the access to safe water has made on their health. Last year I gathered data from the Masindi District Offices to attempt to find an objective way to document the change in health before and after access to a well. That part of the process is ongoing and I will continue those efforts this year if my re-approval for conducting research comes through from the Uganda National Center for Science and Technology. Finally, as a big Thank You to the people of Uganda for allowing my students and me into their lives, I like to bring along some items to donate. Last year I took quilts that a friend of mine and her quilting guild made for the people served by Reverend Mother Evas’ Mother’s Union and Giving Hope programs at the Masindi Kitara Diocese of the Church of Uganda. I will talk about this year’s project a bit more in an upcoming post. For now I have to get back to my packing. Stay tuned…