Category: global health

Ashley Wade is a medical student at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and is mentored by Ross Boyce, MD, MSc. In many parts of Sub‑Saharan Africa, malaria is still one of the main reasons children are hospitalized. In a recent study, Wade and Annika Gunderson, a UNC Epidemiology...

Lauryn Ursery is a PhD student in epidemiology studying at the Gillings School of Global Public Health, mentored by Dr. Ross Boyce. In rural Western Uganda, people living with HIV face unique health risks, including viral acute respiratory infections (ARIs) such as the flu. Ursery presented a study led by...

Omar Zepeda is a PhD student studying at the University of Costa Rica and a fellow of the Nicaraguan Emerging and Endemic Diseases (NEED) program. He is mentored by Filemon Bucardo, PhD. At the recent 4th Annual Global Health Symposium Zepeda presented his findings on the Zika and Dengue viruses...

Claudia Gaither is a PhD student in Epidemiology studying at the Gillings School of Global Public Health, mentored by Michael Emch, PhD. At the 4th Annual Global Health Scholars Symposium, Gaither talked about the relationship between malaria prevalence and proximity to mineral processing pits in northwestern Tanzania, where gold mining...

Nzia Hall has felt drawn to adult neurology for quite some time. As president of the Student Interest Group in Neurology, she helped revive the organization’s UNC chapter and now finds herself in the midst of applying to multiple neurology residency programs.  During her neurology acting internship, Hall met Dr. Deanna...

In the U.S., cancer diagnosis often involves costly biopsies and tests. In the south African country of Malawi, where the average annual income is around $300, patients can rarely afford such procedures — yet accurate diagnoses remain essential. To help, staff of the long-standing UNC Project Malawi Cancer Program are...

The Institute for Global Health and Infectious Diseases (IGHID) and UNC Global Women’s Health announce the first two PhD graduates of the UNC-UNZA-Wits Partnership for HIV and Women’s Reproductive Health Training Program, led by co-principal investigators Carla Chibwesha, MD, MSc, and Benjamin Chi, MD, MSc, in Global Women’s Health. Funded by the Fogarty International Center, part of the...

Palliative care improves the quality of life for patients (adults and children) with life-threatening illness. It prevents and relieves suffering through the early identification and correct assessment and treatment of pain and other problems, whether physical, psychosocial or spiritual. Early delivery of palliative care can also reduce unnecessary hospital admissions...

Cervical cancer is a preventable disease, yet one of the most common causes of death among women globally, despite screening measures proposed by the World Health Organization (WHO). In Malawi, efforts have focused on scaling up cervical cancer screening programs, as well as vaccination against the human papillomavirus (HPV). Still,...

In Sub-Saharan Africa, deaths occur in 5-10% of people living with HIV during the first year after initiating antiretroviral therapy (ART), and the causes for these early deaths are not clear. Matthew Painschab, MD, member of the Institute for Global Health and Infectious Diseases, and an assistant professor of hematology,...

A report published by Lester Gutiérrez, a PhD candidate and IGHID Fellow, provides a new assessment of Giardia lamblia and the pathogenesis of stunting and cognitive growth in children from low- and middle-income countries, published with mentor Luther Bartelt, MD. Giardia is most common during childhood, mainly in low-and-middle income countries. Symptoms...

A new grant from the Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust will help Margaret Kasaro, MBChB, MSc, MMed OBGYN, research assistant professor of global women’s health in the UNC Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, and other team members in their efforts to incorporate portable ultrasounds into antenatal care...