Global Health Calendar 2015

Photos by medical students from the University of Massachusetts Medical School (UMMS)In the summer of 2014 during their learning and service activities

January 2015

Dominican Republic

Left: Salto el Limón is a popular destination for both tourists and locals. Center: Sunset in Las Galeras, Samaná Peninsula. Right: Visitors to the secluded Playa Rincóncan enjoy freshly‐caught fish cooked frito or a la plancha. In 2014, Andrew Wilbur completed a clinical experience at the Instituto Dominicano de Estudios Virológicos(IDEV) in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. IDEV treats patients with HIV/AIDS through the Dominican Republic's national program, and also participates in a number of antiretroviral clinical studies. (Photos by Andrew Wilbur, UMMS Class of 2017)

January 2015

Global Health Fact – Chikungunya:  In late 2013, Chikungunya was found for the first time in the Americas on islands in the Caribbean. Chikungunya is a mosquito‐borne virus that is related to Dengue and causes fever, severe joint pain, headache, muscle pain, joint swelling, and rash. Deaths due to Chikungunyaare rare, but newborns and the elderly are at increased risk of severe, sometimes debilitating disease.  (Source:  CDC, http://www.cdc.gov/chikungunya/)

February 2015China

China is one of the world’s most populous countries and in addition to the abundance of kind people of many ethnicities and languages, both Beijing and Chengdu, Chinaare home to a vast diversity of flora, produce and national historic attractions like the Great Wall of China and Tiananmen Square pictured here. In 2014, Amarilys Rojastraveled to China to learn about how Western and Traditional Chinese Medicine co‐exist to serve both young and old in public hospitals. (Photos by Amarilys Rojas,UMMS Class of 2017)

February 2015

Global Health Fact – Cardiovascular Disease:  Cardiovascular diseases are among the leading causes of mortality worldwide with about 3 in 10 deaths due to these diseases that cause heart attacks and strokes.  A large majority of deaths attributed to cardiovascular diseases could be prevented through maintaining a healthy lifestyle that includes fresh fruits and vegetables, exercise and not smoking.  (Source: World Health Organization’s 10 facts on the state of global health, http://www.who.int/features/factfiles/global_burden/en/)

March 2015

Brazil

A city in the middle of the Amazon rain forest,Manaus, Brazil relies on airplanes and the rivers it was built around for the import of all its supplies. In the summerof 2014, Cecilia Bahamón and Thanh Thu Ngo traveled to the Fundação de Medicina Tropical do Amazonas to learn about infectious diseases in thisgeographically isolated region of Brazil. (Photo by Cecilia Bahamón, UMMS Class of 2017)

March 2015

Global Health Fact – An uncommon form of Hepatitis: To infect a host, Hepatitis D virus requires a co‐infection with Hepatitis B virus and is rare in the United States. However it s a major health concern the Amazon Basin of South America where chronic Hepatitis D occurs in relatively high rates among the indigenous people of Brazil, Venezuela, Colombia, and Peru. (Source: WHO Global Alert and Response: Hepatitis D, http://www.who.int/csr/disease/hepatitis/whocdscsrncs20011/en/index3.html)

April 2015Uganda

Lack of infrastructure in emergency medical and acute care services is a major (and often overlooked) global health challenge facing most of the developing world.Physician shortage and lack of adequate provider training play a large role in the etiology of this problem. The concept of “task shifting”—in which servicestraditionally provided by a physician are shifted to skilled, non‐physician clinicians—is one potential solution. Global Emergency Care Collaborative (GECC) is anonprofit organization based in rural Uganda which employs task shifting and train‐the‐trainer models of medical education to improve access to quality,sustainable emergency care in resource‐limited settings. Simone Miller traveled to Rukungiri, Uganda in 2014 to volunteer with GECC as a clinical research assistant.(Photos by SimoneMiller, UMMS Class of 2017)

April 2015

Global Health Fact – Global emergency medical care: In 2007, the World Health Organization tasked the global health community with addressing the lack of emergency medical care in low and middle‐income countries. The majority of children who die in Sub‐Saharan African hospitals die within 24 hours of admission, often of causes that are readily treatable with inexpensive and effective acute care. Most hospitals here and elsewhere in the developing world still lack designated emergency departments or providers trained in the management of acute injury and illness.  (Sources: Global Emergency Care Collaborative (http://globalemergencycare.org), and Hammerstedt, H, Addressing WHO Resolution 60.22: A Pilot Project to Create Access to Acute Care Services in Uganda (doi: 10.1016/j.annemergmed.2014.01.035).

May 2015Peru

Scenes from life in the altiplano: a group of men prepare for their performance at Mauka llaqta, a traditional dance festival held at an archaeological sitein Nunoa, Peru (left). A rainbow appears during a fierce hail storm above the plains (upper right). Alpacas graze on the slopes of one of the communitiesoutside of town (lower right). Each aspect of mountain life portrayed through these photographs comes to bear in healthcare in the region: theimportance of traditional Quechua practices regarding herbal medicines, the barriers to traveling imposed by difficult conditions and geographicalisolation, and the numerous links between animal and human health in the district. Alyse Wheelock traveled to this region of Southern Peru to learnmore about these connections and how they play out in the health of Nunoans. (Photos by Alyse Wheelock, UMMS Class of 2017)

May 2015

Global Health Fact – Mental health:  Access to mental healthcare varies markedly across poor and wealthy countries worldwide. “Low‐income countries have 0.05 psychiatrists and 0.42 nurses per 100,000 people. The rate of psychiatrists in high income countries is 170 times greater and for nurses is 70 times greater.” (Source:  World Health Organization – Mental Health Facts.  www.who.int/features/factfiles/mental_health/mental_health_facts/en/index7.html)

June 2015Malta

Malta is a small European island country below Sicily and above Libya. Every year, hundreds of refugees from Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Nigeria, and many othercountries (now including Syria and Liberia) arrive by boat on Maltese shores and are detained until their asylum cases can be heard. If they are granted refugee orasylum status, they move in to refugee centers across the country. Today, there are 2 detention facilities, 9 open centers, and approximately 4,000 refugees in acountry smaller than Martha’s Vineyard. (Photos by Vanessa Rooney, UMMS Class of 2017)

June 2015

Global Health Fact – Refugees: “More than 75,000 refugees and migrants arrived in Italy, Greece, Spain, and Malta by sea in the first half of 2014 – 25% more than the 60,000 who made the same journey in 2013, and over three times the 22,500 who arrive in all of 2012.”  (Source:  UNHCR  Calls for Urgent European Action to End Refugee and Migrant Deaths at Sea, http://www.unhcr.org/53d0e2d26.html)

July 2015Kenya 

The hippopotamus (Hippopotamus amphibius), is a common large herbivorous mammal, native to sub‐Saharan Africa. These semiaquatic animals can often befound in Lake Victoria, Africa’s largest lake, which borders Western Kenya. While taking a sunset boat cruise, this hippo was spotted coming up for a yawnafter an afternoon swim. Solange Bayard, Hannah Hoerner, Michele Sainvil and Valerie Valant spent their summer in Kisumu, Kenya, researching Burkitt’sLymphoma, a common pediatric cancer of which the endemic variant is highly prevalent in Western Kenya. (Photo by Solange Bayard, UMMS Class of 2017)

July 2015

Global Health Fact – Health disparities:  While 6 million fewer children died in 2012, compared to 1990, 4 out of every 5 deaths under the age of 5 occurs in sub‐Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia. (Source: UN; http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/2014%20MDG%20report/MDG%202014%20English%20web.pdf)

Worcester, MA U.S.A.

The mission of the African Community Education (ACE) program is to help refugee status children living in Worcester, MA to realize their educational, cultural, and social goals while guiding them in becoming responsible and productive citizens. The pictures show youth at a number of activities organized by the ACE program. In 2014, Gisele Njinda (UMMS, Class of 2017) was a summer intern at the ACE program, helping  with their afterschool curriculum. (Photos provided by Kim Edwards, ACE)

August 2015

August 2015

Global Health Fact – Refugees:  More than 43 million people worldwide are now forcibly displaced as a result of conflict and persecution, the highest number since the mid‐1990s. Children constitute about 41 percent of the world’s refugees, and about half of all refugees are women. Four‐fifths of all refugees are in the developing world, in nations that can least afford to host them.  (Source: UN, http://www.un.org/en/globalissues/briefingpapers/refugees/)

September 2015England

London, England is home to the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Located in the heart of the central part of the city, thisresearch and post‐graduate academic center calls on the world’s international experts to answer some of the biggest questions in globalhealth. (Photo by Hana Haver, UMMS Class of 2017)

September 2015

Global Health Fact – Chocolate and Nobel Prizes: A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine plotted per capita chocolate consumption to the number of Nobel Prizes won by members of each country. Switzerland was the top performer in both chocolate consumption and Nobel Prize winning. (Source:  http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23050509)

October 2015Guatemala 

Guatemalan pediatric oncologists work tirelessly to ensure that every child arriving at the hospital with cancer is given the best care possible.However, because of socioeconomic, logistical, and geographical disparities, children living with cancer outside of Guatemala City, the country’scapital, have a higher risk of suffering consequences from their illness. In the summer of 2014, Nitin Shrivastava went to Guatemala to develop aprogram to connect rural physicians with physicians at the pediatric cancer hospital for earlier diagnosis and improved care for patients. Photoabove is of Quetzaltenango, Guatemala. (Photo by Nitin Shrivastava, UMMS Class of 2017)

October 2015

Global Health Fact – Access to health care: In Guatemala, there are only 9.3 physicians for every 10,000 people, most of whom are located within the city limits of Guatemala City. In comparison, the United States has 24.2 physicians per 10,000 people. (Source: The Kaiser Family Foundation, http://kff.org/global‐indicator/physicians). 

November 2015Kenya

Kenya, although well known for its large mammals, is also famous for its diverse and exquisite bird population. Over 1,000 species of birds exist inKenya, which accounts for 11% of the entire world’s population. This bird was spotted on a trek up Mount Kenya, the highest mountain in Kenya andsecond highest in Africa. Solange Bayard, Hannah Hoerner, Michele Sainvil and Valerie Valant spend the summer working and shadowing at theJaramogi Oginga Odinga Teaching and Referral Hospital (JOOTRH), in Kisumu, Kenya. (Photo by: Hannah Hoerner, UMMS Class of 2017)

November 2015

Global Health Fact – sanitation and water resources:  Nearly 10% of global diseases and 6.3% of all deaths could be prevented just by improving water supply, sanitation, hygiene, and management of water resources. By improving these conditions millions of child deaths from diarrhea, malaria, malnutrition, and drowning could be prevented each year. (Source: WHO, http://whqlibdoc.who.int/publications/2008/9789241596435_eng.pdf)

December 2015India

India bears the greatest burden worldwide of poor maternal and child health. An ongoing study, Understanding Predictors of Maternal and Child Health inRural Western India, aims to examine the interplay of social and environmental factors in perinatal health and their longitudinal impact on maternal andchild health. In 2014, Jasmine Khubchandani, Haley Newman, and Michaela Tracy traveled to Gujarat to contribute to ongoing research on maternal andchild health and gain insight into the medical care available for pregnant and postpartum women in India. (Photo by Haley Newman, UMMS Class of 2017)

December 2015

Global Health Fact – Sanitation:  The number of people resorting to open defecation globally has decreased by 271 million since 1990. Still, open defection is practiced by 1.1 billion people – 15 per cent of the global population. (Source:  The 2012 WHO and UNICEF Progress on Drinking Water and Sanitation, http://www.unicef.org/media/files/JMPreport2012.pdf)

Proceeds from the 2015 Global Health Calendar will go toward a global health service projectthat will be led by medical students from the UMass Medical School Class of 2017

Thank you for your support!

Michael Chin, MD  and  Ann Moormann, PhD, MPHCo‐Directors, International Medical Education Program

Co‐Directors, Global Health PathwayUniversity of Massachusetts Medical School

A special thank you to Peter and Joe Gardner and staff at Curry Printingwww.curryprinting.com

Photos  in this calendar are courtesy of the Global Health Pathway, Class of 2017: Cecilia BahamonSolange BayardHana HaverHannah HoernerSimone MillerHaley NewmanThanh Thu NgoGisele NjindaNoreen Chioma OkwaraAmarilys RojasVanessa RooneyMarie‐Michele SainvilNitin ShrivastavaValerie Valant Alyse WheelockAndrew Wilbur