Partnership Model & Education Exchange in Kenya
Individual, collaborative relationships form the cornerstone of the AMPATH program. Each visiting AMPATH Consortium faculty member in Kenya works with his/her Kenyan counterpart under the direction of the Kenyan leadership. Consortium partner post-graduate physicians in training (residents) work alongside Kenyan medical officers and registrars (post-graduate trainees equivalent to Consortium residents), and Consortium medical students work and live with Kenyan medical students. Counterpart relationships are similarly emphasized when Kenyan faculty, registrars, and students visit the AMPATH Consortium institutions.
Indiana University supports several of its faculty members full-time in Eldoret. The executive site director, whose counterpart relationships are with the director of MTRH and the principal of Moi University College of Health Sciences, oversees all AMPATH Consortium activities on-site in Kenya. The faculty team leaders in medicine, pediatrics, OB/GYN, surgery, adolescent health, pharmacy and hematology/oncology supervise all visiting residents and students and coordinate the clinical activities of all visiting faculty members. A program administrator in Eldoret provides logistic/scheduling support and oversees the AMPATH Consortium Compound (also commonly referred to as “IU House”). Co-site directors of research help lead and coordinate AMPATH’s research activities and assist Consortium researchers to navigate the Kenyan research environment. The IU Center for Global Health Equity coordinates all Consortium travel and work schedules, and maintains the fourteen houses in the IU House compound and a fleet of vehicles in Eldoret.
The Consortium-Kenyan partnership enables AMPATH Consortium students and residents to take one to two-month electives in Eldoret under the supervision of the AMPATH Consortium team leaders. While at Moi University, the residents’ responsibilities include patient care, teaching, research and public health activities in Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital and urban and rural health centers.
To promote bilateral exchange, the AMPATH Consortium provides full scholarship support each year for selected MUSM students (23 medical, 4 nursing, and 2 physiotherapy students in 2024) to participate in 6-8 week electives at Consortium institutions. Additionally, many Kenyan registrars (equivalent to a medical resident) have been hosted for 1-6 months by Consortium institutions. More than 2,200 Kenyan and Consortium trainees have participated in the bilateral exchange program. More than 150 Kenyan faculty members and post-graduate trainees have also been sponsored to visit and pursue training opportunities at AMPATH Consortium schools and centers.