“Our University of Louisville has been working with partners in Tamale, Ghana, for the last 14 years,” said division chief of pediatric global health and Humana Endowed Chair in International Pediatrics. “When we learned that AMPATH would also begin working at the same hospital and medical school in Northern Ghana, our group was thrilled at the idea of partnering with a consortium which has such a strong track record of effective global health collaboration.”  

AMPATH is the Academic Model Providing Access to Health Care. UofL joins 14 other universities and medical schools around the world working in partnership with public sector hospitals and medical schools in Ghana, Kenya, Mexico and Nepal.

In Ghana, the partnership is led by (UDS-SoM) (TTH) and . The partnership launched in early 2019 with support provided to Indiana University from and .

As part of the AMPATH Ghana partnership, UofL will embrace the AMPATH philosophy to “Lead with Care” by continuing to provide pediatric clinical care that supports research and education in child health. This will include augmenting sub-specialty care in pediatrics, hosting two-way exchange of learners, initiating research grants focused on child health and broadening UofL’s institutional support with partners in Tamale, Ghana.

“The AMPATH Consortium welcomes the University of Louisville and we look forward to working together to both enhance their existing work in Ghana while learning from their expertise in international pediatrics to grow all of the AMPATH partnerships,” said Adrian Gardner, MD, MPH, executive director of the AMPATH Consortium.

“We are very excited to work with our colleagues at University of Louisville to grow pediatric medicine education, research and care in Tamale, Ghana,” said Professor Stephen Tabiri, MD, PhD, FGCS, FACS, FWACS, MEd (Adm.) dean of UDS-SoM.  “We are looking forward to a very fruitful partnership.” 

Dr. Adam Atiku, CEO of Tamale Teaching Hospital added, “We are looking forward to further collaborating with our colleagues from the University of Louisville, with whom we have had over a decade-long partnership, as they join the AMPATH Consortium to continue in our collective quest to improve pediatric and child healthcare to clients within northern Ghana and beyond. We are very excited to see what we can achieve together for children in northern Ghana.”

The AMPATH Ghana partnership is based on a collaborative model that has helped to build a sustainable healthcare system over the past three decades in western Kenya.

“AMPATH Ghana’s long-term partnership model presents a unique opportunity for University of Louisville faculty and trainees. We look forward to building relationships with our counterparts to strengthen pediatric care delivery in Tamale and northern Ghana,” Rajesh Vedanthan, MD, MPH, MS, director of the Section for Global Health at the Institute for Excellence in Health Equity and associate professor in the Department of Population Health at NYU Langone.

In April, UofL faculty and residents traveled to Ghana and stayed in the AMPATH Ghana House with full-time faculty from NYU Grossman School of Medicine while working and training alongside Ghanaian faculty and residents.

“That experience further solidified our strong desire to be a part of the AMPATH Consortium. Seeing first-hand the projects which have already been started, how well they are partnered with our colleagues in Ghana, and how smoothly they managed the logistics in Ghana sealed the deal for our plans to join AMPATH,” said Williams. 

The AMPATH Consortium is led by Indiana University and includes Brown University, Dell Medical School at The University of Texas at Austin, Duke University, Kaiser Permanente Bernard J. Tyson School of Medicine, Linköping University (Sweden), Mount Sinai, NYU Langone Health, Purdue University, Stanford University Center for Innovation in Global Health, University of Alberta, University of California San Francisco, University of Toronto and the University of Virginia.

The division of pediatric global health at UofL was established as the international pediatrics division by George Rodgers, MD, more than 25 years ago with a partnership in Romania and other eastern European countries. The Humana Foundation generously provided funding for the division’s creation. Faculty in the division include Jackson Williams, MD; Nicole Bichir, MD; Sheridan Langford, MD; Bethany Hodge, MD, MPH (completed a rotation in AMPATH’s Kenya partnership in 2009); Dan Stewart, MD; Dan Blatt, MD; Mirzada Kurbasic, MD; and Kelly Frazier, MD. The division also has a partnership in Ecuador.

Until recently, Friends Eye Center in Tamale, Ghana, lacked basic ophthalmic equipment and the center’s surgical microscope was outdated and cumbersome. The center, directed by Seth Wanye, MD, provides vision care for nearly 3 million residents of the West African nation and serves as a training site for future ophthalmologists.

Henry J. Kaplan, MD, chair of the UofL Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences, visited Friends Eye Center during a medical mission trip several years ago.

“Most of the equipment they had was non-functional. The equipment we gave them we no longer use because of the acquisition of more technologically-advanced diagnostic devices,” Kaplan said. “Many of the people there have totally lost their eyesight and are dependent on their relatives and other support structures, which presents an enormous economic burden.”

Wanye, who regularly visits UofL to enhance his surgical skills, was visiting Louisville in 2015 when Kaplan offered to donate the equipment to his center in Ghana.

“It was like a dream come true,” Wanye said. “It helps me perform thorough examinations of the eye so I can identify other problems, not just the cataract that you can see. It also gives the patients comfort and they are fascinated.”

Shipping large items to Africa is not a simple process, however, and it was nearly a year before the equipment reached the center. Thanks to multiple organizations that shared the expense and worked to transport the instruments, the Friends Eye Center now has a slit lamp, which allows Wanye to examine his patients’ eyes more precisely, a better surgical microscope, chairs for both the surgeon and the patient, and an auto refractor for determining eyeglass prescriptions.

Wanye, who was the only ophthalmologist serving the Northern and Upper West regions of Ghana until a colleague joined him last year, also works with future physicians in the center to introduce them to the specialty of ophthalmology. Most Ghanaian medical students choose other specialties since ophthalmology is not a medical priority in Ghana.

“You have so many other diseases that are killing people. They say eye diseases don’t kill so they are overlooked,” Wanye said. But he has seen that restoring vision allows individuals to regain their independence and enables children to go back to school.

“When you go out into the villages, people are poor, they don’t have money but they are blind. So we will get the resources and do the surgery.”

Wanye receives funding from non-governmental organizations, such as and the , to provide eye screenings and perform between 2,000 and 4,000 cataract surgeries each year. In addition to screenings and surgeries on location, Wanye provides care for patients in the Friends Eye Center.

“To be one doctor that serves millions of people is not a trivial task. He does it because of a love and conviction for the good that he is doing. I really do admire what he’s doing and that’s why we are more than happy to assist him,” Kaplan said. This is the first time UofL’s ophthalmology department has donated equipment to a foreign health-care organization.

Wanye hopes to establish a regular exchange between UofL ophthalmologists and the center, similar to a program in which residents and faculty members from the UofL Department of Pediatrics travel to the Tamale Teaching Hospital several times each year. Tamale is an official sister city to Louisville.

“My dream is to have some continuous program, especially with the residents’ program here, so we would have residents coming to Friends Eye Center,” Wanye said. In the meantime, he is grateful to UofL for the donated equipment. “We know how valuable they are and how expensive they are. They will help us deliver more quality service to our people. Thank you to everyone at UofL,” Wanye said.

Equipment photos courtesy Friends Eye Center, Tamale, Ghana

“The resilience and commitment of students and faculty to education in spite of challenges, including access to library resources and learning tools, periodic power outages, and logistical problems, was truly inspiring,” Harris said.

During her time in Ghana, Harris worked as professor at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) in Kumasi, School of Public Health, teaching a course in curriculum development and three courses on a variety of health promotion topics. She co-wrote two grants, served as a supervisor for a graduate student thesis and one dissertation, and completed a curriculum development project resulting in a report, “School of Public Health KNUST, Curriculum Development Study Report”. Harris also worked on a research project about the perpetration of sexual violence with the non-profit organization, Ultimate Health; she hopes to continue that research agenda in the United States.

As a result of her engagement with KNUST students, Harris helped lead a community development project to build and commission a restroom facility with six toilets for 350 students and teachers at Pramkese Presby Primary School. She says restrooms are scarce in less populated regions of Ghana, and although this was not an expectation of the Fulbright program, she made personal contributions to help make the project possible.

“It was fulfilling to be a role model for community development, and see how others came together to give funds or in-kind gifts like cement to create a much needed facility that we often take for granted in the United States,” she said.

Among the other highlights of Harris’ experience included participating in the Rotary Club of Kumasi, attending Akwasidae – a festival held every 42 days to pay homage to the Ashanti King, and helping host a U.S. ambassador.

“The most important lesson I learned was that everyone wants the best from their lives, and strives for that goal in the best way they know,” Harris said. “It is important when immersing into another culture to find out what people want and support that rather than going in with an agenda and trying to create change. It is best to merge with their philosophies.”

About the Fulbright Scholar Program

Each year, the awards nearly 600 teaching, research or combination teaching/research awards in more than 125 countries. The competitive program is open to college and university faculty and administrators, as well as artists, journalists, scientists, lawyers, independent scholars, and other professionals.

Taylor claims this will be the first festival of its kind in Ghana, with a focus on classical music pedagogy, performance and academic training. His objectives are to promote artistic development among that country’s youth, and to facilitate international collaboration.

The festival will also mark a sort of homecoming for Taylor, who spent his formative years – 1993 through 2006 – growing up in Ghana with his missionary parents. His family lived in the capital city of Accra for a year, then moved to a remote area, Ho, for three years before spending the rest of their time in Takoradi.

“Growing up there was fantastic. I love the people, the culture, the food, everything about it,” Taylor said. “The musical history and style is very interesting.”

Taylor himself didn’t pick up music until he was back in the United States, however. He “failed at” piano and trumpet, but gravitated toward the guitar – folk and steel string, specifically – after learning Johann Sebastian Bach’s Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring.

“That song made me realize this is what I really loved to do. A few years later, in 2009, I began studying classical music formally,” he said. “It was something that just happened by chance and it helped me transition back to the States.”

Taylor admits he was socially awkward upon his return to the U.S. Although he was born in Florida, he had lived in Ghana since he was 1.

“Coming back to the U.S. was a culture shock. It was classical guitar that got me out of that rut,” Taylor said. “Music resonated with me. It pushed my social skills beyond where I was at the time.”

Taylor stuck with it, eventually receiving his bachelor’s degree in music and performance from Columbus State University in Georgia. He received a full TA, alongside Professor Stephen Mattingly, to receive his master’s degree from UofL, and graduated last month. He calls Mattingly a mentor.

“We really hit it off and I cannot even begin to explain how much I learned from his program. It’s been really incredible. (Mattingly) is a big reason the festival in Ghana is actually happening,” Taylor said.

Taylor received a $1,000 summer music grant and Mattingly suggested he pursue something “non-generic; something greater than what I wanted to do.” He put the money toward the initial visit to Ghana to facilitate planning sessions with the university and symphony there.

Professor Mattingly will accompany Taylor to Ghana for the inaugural festival in July, as will Ciyadh Wells, also from UofL’s School of Music. The three of them will work to build relationships, as well as teach and perform alongside young Ghanaian musicians and symphony members. Taylor hopes they are also successful at planting seeds for future, annual festivals.

“This year’s event is specifically a collaboration with UofL and the University of Ghana. The priority is just to make sure it happens. I don’t expect it to be easy, but we are keeping it small so we have room to grow and the infrastructure in place to do it again,” Taylor said.

In the fall, Taylor will move onto another opportunity as a TA at the Shenandoah Conservatory in Virginia, where he will pursue a PhD. If he reaches his goal of extending this festival beyond the first year, however, he will keep the invitation open for UofL faculty to be collaborators. 

“I am not concerned about personal gains from this. It doesn’t need to be tied to a school I teach at,” Taylor said. “I just want it to be a partnership between the U.S. and Ghana. We have strong relations politically, economically. But within the arts, there is very little collaboration. I want this to be a catalyst for new opportunities for performance initiatives, classical music programs, exchange programs and more.”