Faculty Members Join AMPATH Consortium in Kenya
Dr. Bill Stauffer, Dr. Rachel Ogumbo and Dr. Jenny Yang
The AMPATH Consortium welcomes Bill Stauffer, MD, as the new executive site director and Jenny Yang, MD, and Rachel Ogumbo, PharmD, MBS, BCPS, as new team leaders for reproductive health and pharmacy.
Dr. Bill Stauffer—Executive Site Director (Indiana University)
Dr. Stauffer joins AMPATH from the University of Minnesota where he was director of Human Mobility and Health at the Center for Global Health and Social Responsibility and a professor in the Departments of Medicine and Pediatrics, and the School of Public Health. He is an expert in infectious diseases and tropical medicine and has served as the lead medical advisor for the Division of Global Migration and Quarantine at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention since 2005. In addition, he has held advisory positions with other national and international organizations including the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, the US State Department and the World Health Organization. He developed and currently leads the National Resource Center for Refugees, Immigrants and Migrants (NRC-RIM), which was established early in the pandemic and emerged as the lead national organization responding to the public health emergency in these marginalized populations.
Dr. Stauffer founded the University of Minnesota Global Medicine Program in 1999 and has done research, clinical work and policy development in, and with, more than two dozen countries. He has also led a successful bidirectional capacity building program with the UN Migration Health Agency/International Organization for Migration training and exchanging hundreds of physicians, nurses and other healthcare personnel worldwide. He lived with his family in Tanzania in 2007-08 and worked in clinical medicine education, research, public health and policy. One aspect of his work in Tanzania was to collaborate with the government and NGO partners, leveraging avian influenza grants from USAID and CDC to establish Tanzania's first respiratory disease surveillance system. A system that is still in use. He and his spouse Carol, a social worker and public health professional, were looking for an opportunity to return to Africa when he heard about the executive site director position.
“I have worked in the global health arena for about 25 years and witnessed many models and strategies--some more successful, some less, and some that were even harmful,” said Dr. Stauffer. “It was clear on our first visit to Eldoret that AMPATH is a model program where bidirectional capacity building and creating a true equitable partnership took priority. I was hooked!”
Dr. Stauffer will work closely with the team leaders and Kenyan trainees and faculty to further the objectives, mission and vision of the AMPATH partnership. He will focus on teaching, mentoring, contributing to curriculum building, and formulating research questions and directions. “I hope having a broad knowledge base and experience in internal medicine, pediatrics, pediatric emergency medicine, infectious diseases and tropical medicine, and public health will bring some new, broader perspectives to consortium partners, faculty and trainees,” he said.
He also looks forward to the opportunity to learn new things about himself and develop new and lasting relationships. “Although I learn something new in medicine almost every day, at this point in my career, the most valuable lessons and skills I hope to develop and foster are less factual and more life skills--things like developing my own compassion, cultural humility and insights from working with, and learning from, people with unique life experiences. I am also at a point where I am less focused on my own professional development, and instead, really enjoy and thrive in creating opportunities and supporting younger trainees and health professionals to develop their own careers and in fulfilling their efforts to reduce suffering, successfully create their own lasting positive impact, and ultimately, to leave the world better then they found it. I feel grateful for this opportunity,” he concluded.
Jenny Yang, MD—Reproductive Health Team Leader (University of Toronto)
Dr. Yang is from Australia and completed her medical degree and Masters in Global Health at the University of New South Wales and her OBGYN residency at the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital all in Sydney, Australia. She is completing the Global Women's Health and Equity Fellowship at the University of Toronto Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology which includes the role as reproductive health team leader for the AMPATH Consortium.
She has worked in rural Australia, Vanuatu, Papua New Guinea, and with Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors without Borders) in Pakistan and Afghanistan. She has also volunteered in rural Cambodia, Thailand and South Korea.
Dr. Yang was attracted to the role with AMPATH because of the sustainability of the partnership and strong focus on capacity building. “I am eager to both contribute to the work of AMPATH, teaching and providing care, and to also learn principles and strategies that have led to AMPATH's success for my future endeavors in global health,” said Dr. Yang.
The reciprocal exchange of knowledge and skills from different cultural contexts and training backgrounds also attracted her to the role. She looks forward to fostering relationships through which she and her Kenyan counterparts can learn from each other, as well as creating research collaborations that can continue long-term.
While in Eldoret, Dr. Yang will continue her involvement in a multi-country study (including Kenya, India and Canada) to improve cardiac risk stratification of pregnant women with rheumatic heart disease. The study seeks to improve accurate identification of those at increased risk of cardiac complications. “I am also passionate about exploring causes of preventable neonatal deaths due to oxygen deprivation during labor (known as ‘intrapartum birth asphyxia’), and teaching OBGYN ultrasound skills, particularly to enhance point-of-care assessment,” she added.
Rachel Ogumbo, PharmD, MBS, BCPS—Pharmacy Team Leader (Purdue)
For the past 10 years, Dr. Ogumbo has served as a community pharmacist, Medication Therapy Management (MTM) specialist, clinical pharmacy preceptor and community leader addressing chronic disease management needs in underserved populations in southern Arizona. “My passion for serving low resourced communities led me to work with Hopi and Navajo Native Americans as well as refugees who immigrated to the US from East African nations such as the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, Burundi, and Somalia,” she said. In this role she went beyond basic pharmacy responsibilities to seek culturally sensitive strategies to meaningfully meet varying patient needs. “I am deeply grateful for the opportunity to continue my journey in addressing similar healthcare challenges by ‘starting with care and doing more’ with AMPATH Kenya”
“As the Pharmacy team leader, I am excited to support and guide practices in a manner that reflects humility, sensibility, and innovation,” Dr. Ogumbo continued. She looks forward to learning more about local healthcare challenges such as barriers to medication access and challenges to proper medication use and identifying strategies to meet these needs through stakeholder engagement.
She will be working with the Bridging Income Generation with Group Integrated Care (BIGPIC) and Revolving Fund Pharmacy (RFP) initiatives while in Kenya. “These projects are exciting because they demonstrate pharmacists’ capacity to serve as critical contributors amongst interdisciplinary efforts that address a wide array of needs amongst underserved populations in rural Kenya. Pharmacy is a rapidly evolving profession with capacity to address increasing global health challenges. I am excited about the opportunity to support these projects in a manner that empowers the next generation of pharmacists to envision and pursue our field’s unlimited potential,” she continued.
Dr. Ogumbo is also excited about the opportunity to precept local and international pharmacy students. “I enjoy helping students build confidence and realize the richness of their knowledge, which, I believe, is a journey that extends far beyond the clinical setting.”
Karibu Kenya, Dr. Stauffer, Dr. Yang and Dr. Ogumbo!