Institute of Public Health
U.S. (Georgia) - Ibadan (Nigeria) Partnership for Prevention Sciences Training, Urban Environmental Quality and Community Health
A team from the Institute of Public Health worked for a week in Nigeria during March to continue building and planning their collaboration for classroom and field research-based training in community environmental health and emerging chronic disease epidemiology for health professionals with the College of Medicine, University of Ibadan (UI). The interdisciplinary team includes Principal Investigator Dr. Derek Shendell (back row, left side), Dr. Ike Okosun (front row, far left), Dr. Eme Owoaje of UI (front row, to right of Dr. Okosun), and MPH student Heartley Egwuogu (fourth from left, next to the UI Dean of Medicine).
In both industrialized nations like the United States (U.S.) and less developed countries (LDCs) in certain regions of the world like Nigeria in sub-Saharan West Africa, there is rapid development coupled with population growth, urbanization and/or sprawl, and strains on limited resources, due to inequities in their distribution, access, availability and/or use. The natural and human--or built--environments are increasingly burdened by pollution and adversely impacted.
Our multidisciplinary goal is a training center for current and prospective Nigerian health professionals and agency staff seeking enhanced awareness, knowledge and skills in environmental and occupational science, public health, exposure assessment, and epidemiology (infectious and chronic diseases) to reduce or prevent negative effects.
Specific aims of our collaboration--started with an internal award ("International Strategic Initiatives, 7/2006-6/2007) and pending external funding--are:
- Training new, full-time Nigerian students with clinical backgrounds in prevention sciences, (environmental health sciences (EHS), epidemiology of chronic and infectious diseases).
- Providing government agency officials (health, education, natural resources, etc) and medical/health professionals interested in public health, environmental and occupational health and epidemiology an intensive four-part, short-course training workshop in 1-2 weeks in Nigeria at Ibadan.
- Research pilot projects/studies in Nigeria, involving qualitative and/or quantitative data collection, conducted by MPH students in collaboration with U.S. and Nigerian faculty.
Click here to read more about the College of Medicine at the University of Ibadan, Nigeria.