Towards safer hospital care in Africa: a Christ Church Research Centre project

This vital research was the subject of a workshop, ‘Patient Safety in Low-Resource Setting Hospitals’, hosted in the Christ Church Research Centre last week. Professor English convened medical professionals and experts from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Ghana, Nigeria, Egypt, Kenya and Burundi, as well as visiting experts from the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Universities of Oxford, Cambridge and Leeds. Among the key participants were Professor English’s Congolese research project partners Dr Mudji E’kitiak and Dr David Kamate, both of whom work in Vanga Hospital in the DRC.

Vanga Hospital – a faith-based, non-profit institution located 500km from Kinshasa – serves a largely poor and rural population of 350,000 people. Dr E’kitiak and Dr Kamate have extensive experience working in this remote hospital, where resources are limited and healthcare challenges are immense. Both doctors are acutely aware of the need for practical approaches to patient safety assessment in their home country: the DRC has some of the highest maternal and child mortality rates in the world, and faces an overall life-expectancy of just 59 years. 

The ultimate aim of Professor English’s project is to find scalable solutions to improve patient safety in hospitals like Vanga across Africa. The initial goal is to assess safety systems in rural African hospitals, with a long-term vision of developing adaptable training materials and courses that could be implemented in similar settings across the continent. A particular focus is on creating a training programme for generalist doctors to manage rural hospital services in Vanga and Kinshasa, with hopes to expand these efforts to other African hospitals.

Professor English explained the importance of his team’s research and the difference that Christ Church’s support has made: ‘Unsafe care is estimated to contribute to over 2.5 million deaths a year, most in low- and middle-income countries, but strategies to reduce the burden in low-resource hospitals are rarely studied. 

‘Christ Church, through an initial research grant and by making its research centre available, enabled African healthcare leaders and researchers and a multidisciplinary group of Oxford and other UK experts to discuss how together we might start to address the huge challenge of unsafe care in hospitals in Africa and globally.’

Supported by the Christ Church Research Grant, Dr E’kitiak and Dr Kamate spent a week at the Research Centre, participating in discussions and sharing their insights at the workshop with the diverse group of medical experts and professionals. Throughout the week, participants explored the realities of working in resource-limited healthcare environments, discussing staff and patient experiences, system challenges, and potential pathways to enhancing safety. 

The collaboration with Vanga Hospital represents a promising opportunity for Christ Church to forge stronger links with healthcare institutions in Africa. In the future, this partnership could create meaningful exchanges between Christ Church students and Vanga Hospital, fostering international collaboration to tackle global healthcare challenges.