AMWA Global Health

Mother's Day

2011-05-06T11:00:00.000-07:00

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!

This Sunday, May, 8 2011, we celebrate Mother's Day as an American tradition. This holiday was officially started in 1914 when Anna Jarvis convinced the US Congress to designate the second Sunday of May as "Mother's Day."

As Mother's Day reaches its centennial, the United States had 82.8 million mothers celebrating this holiday in 2008, each of those mothers have an average of 2.1 children, according to Census data. In 2003, the U.S. Mortality rate was 12.1 deaths per 100,000 live births. This low maternal mortality rate and fertility rate suggest that the United States may be taking reasonably good care of its mothers. From this standpoint it is quite reasonable that we may feel more comfortable focusing on the high maternal mortality rates in Sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East and South Asia.

This is important, mothers around the world need our advocacy and need our support as we push for greater rights for women and greater reproductive health education and implementation. Furthermore, it is true that the maternal mortality statistic is where we find the largest disparity between low-income countries and high income countries. According to the World Health Organization (WHO) , 99% of deaths during childbirth occur in low-income countries. For example, the chance of maternal death in high income countries is 1 in 7300, where as in low income countries it is 1 in 73. As young people, this is especially important and relevant because most of the young women who are dying could very well be our friends, schoolmates and classmates had they lived in a different country (particularly if they had been fortunate enough to live in a high income country as we do). The leading cause of death in young women aged 15-19 in low-income countries is from childbirth complications. This particular reality hits quite close to me because women in my family had children when they were young; my grandmother was married when she was 13 years old. I worked at a Maternity Hospital in Liberia last summer and saw girls my own age and younger in childbirth, and unfortunately in some cases, dying in child birth.

However, although US data are quite encouraging when compared a low-income country such as Liberia, in comparison to other high-income countries the United States has a high maternal mortality rate. The World Health Organization's estimate in the year 2000 of the U.S. maternal mortality was 17 deaths per 100,000 live births, 13 in the UK, 7 in New Zealand, 8 in Germany and 5 in Denmark.

These statistics are perhaps related to other reproductive health (and general health) statistics in which the U.S. lags behind other countries, such as contraceptive prevalence. In a climate of abstinence-only education, it is no wonder that our contraceptive prevalence rates are low compared to other high-income countries that tend to have comprehensive sex education.

It is also important to point out that in a country like the United States where there is high inequality, we also see inequality in maternal health statistics. According to the CDC the maternal mortality statistic in black women was 30.5 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births compared to the 8.5 rate for white women and the 12.1 rate for all races. Black women were thus more than 3 times more likely than white women to die during child birth than white women. This is simply unacceptable.

Maternal mortality is obviously an important international policy issue, improving this crisis is the 5th Millenium Development Goal (the Millenium Development Goals are a set of internationally recognized goals that many countries are striving to acheive). However it is important just as important that we back up our rhetoric about celebrating mothers with more than just fluffy holidays and ideals. The causes of maternal mortality are clear, the World Health Organization (WHO) lists the following as key reasons:

According to UNICEF, the best approach for solutions would be a holistic, continuum of care approach:

During the past decade, UNICEF has taken a holistic and rights based view of maternal health. To this end, UNICEF has been working to enhance the role of women, prevent child marriage, increase girls education, educate and abolish Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting (FGM/C), and support the development of adolescent life skills. UNICEF supports improved antenatal care (Tetanus Toxoid, Insecticide treated nets (ITN), Intermittent Presumptive Treatment (IPT), nutrition), Prevention of Mother to Child Transmission of HIV (PMTCT), increased women’s access to HIV treatment. Depending on country needs, UNICEF also supports training of skilled birth attendants (SBA), Emergency Obstetric Care programmes (EmOC) and more recently, improved newborn and post natal care initiatives.
Recent evidence, highlighted in the Lancet Series on child survival (2003), newborn survival (2005), maternal survival (2006) and on reproductive health (2006), reveal that a package of interventions, if implemented at scale, could substantially reduce both newborn and maternal mortality.

We need to press Congress to continue to fund UNFPA in a time when funding for international programs is being cut. However we can not expect this administration to do this alone and they will not without the support and advocacy from Congress (and their constituents), the public and advocates like you and I.

It is thus important that we as activists take action against maternal mortality by advocating for comprehensive sex education, safe abortion, affordable contraception and healthcare (particularly antenatal and emergency obstetric care) for low-income mothers both in the United States and abroad. This is the best way we can be assured that will make a difference in lives around the world by reducing maternal mortality rates and disparities within the United States and around the world.

TAKE ACTION:
1. Create a program at your medical school for Maternal Mortality awareness and advocacy, hold a lunch lecture, etc
2. Advocate for legislation that will fight for the reproductive health and rights of women and girls across the world
3. Educate yourself at the World Health Organization page on Maternal Mortality
4. Read more about maternal mortality in the United States from this CDC publication
5. Check out WHO's media center on maternal mortality it contains first-hand stories, informative videos and photographs
6 Learn more about Millenium Development Goal (MGD) 5: Improve Maternal Health
7. Check out this New York Times Op-Ed peice about what women's health experts would give women for Mother's Day
8. Did you know that the Taj Mahal, one of the seven wonders of the world, was built because of a woman (the Sultan's wife) who died in childbirth?

We're Back!

2010-07-26T13:46:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the long break! It took us a while but we are back!

We have been busy getting everything set up for the Carter Global Health Fellowship that we are about to launch!

Here is a quick video about the Duke Global Health Masters Degree we learned about while putting together resources for the Carter Fellowship.

For now we have discovered a few more resources that we would like to share:

1) Global Health Magazine: This is a magazine run by the Global Health Council which is the largest global health organization. It is free to read certain topics online. It is a great way to stay up on the current events in global health.

2) Unite for Sight Global Health University Online Resources. I especially like the global health online e-learning resources. We have used quite a few links from this website (ie. modules) as part of the curriculum for the Carter Fellowship.

3) Duke University Global Health Residency - I bet you are already hooked! Global Health residency? How awesome? The only problem is that you should have already done a residency first, this is something additional. But its quite awesome.

And there is also the option of a Masters in Global Health.

Fogarty International Clinical Research Scholars Program

2010-03-28T20:14:00.000-07:00

The Fogarty International Clinical Research Scholars Program is a great program for those out there interested in public health research and clinical science research in a global context. This is a program specifically for students enrolled in a PhD program in the allied health fields including public health.

A brief excerpt on the program from the website:

Would you like a unique chance to experience clinical research training in a developing country? Would you like to work with a strong team of mentors and colleagues on important problems that advance people's health?

The Fogarty International Clinical Research Scholars and Fellows (FICRS-F) Support Center at Vanderbilt is offering a one-year clinical research training experience for graduate-level U.S. students in the health professions. This is an opportunity for highly motivated individuals to experience mentored research training at top-ranked NIH-funded research centers in developing countries.

Fellowship Sites:

Mass General Hospital/Bangladesh-ICDDR,B
Bangladesh:ICDDR,B
Harvard School of Public Health/Botswana-Harvard AIDS Institute
Weil Cornell Medical Collge/Brazil, Federal Univ of Bahia & FIOCRUZ
Vanderbilt Institute for Global Health/China: Beijing - NCAIDS & China CDC
China: Beijing - The Cancer Institute and Hospital of the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences (CICAMS)
UNC Chapel Hill/China: Nanjing - NCSTD & WHO Collaborating Center on Prevention and Control of STIs
Vanderbilt Epidemiology Center/China: Shanghai Cancer Institute
Weil Cornell Medical College/Haiti: GHESKIO
The Miriam Hospital & Brown University/India: Chennai - YR Gaitonde Centre for AIDS Research and Education
Rollins School of Public Health, Emory University/India: New Delhi - Public Health Foundation of India
Tufts University School of Medicine/India: Vellore - Christian Medical College
The Miriam Hospital/Brown University/Kenya: Eldoret - Moi University School of Medicine
University of Washington/Kenya: Nairobi - University of Nairobi
UNC Chapel Hill/Malawi: Lilongwe - UNC Project
University of Maryland/Mali: Bamako - University of Bamako/Mali Service Center
Univ. of Washington/Peru: Lima - Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia, Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos, Investigacion Medica en Salud
Johns Hopkins School of Public Health/Peru: Lima - Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia, A.B. PRISMA
Mailman School of Public Health,Columbia University/South Africa: Cape Town - Centre for the AIDS Programme of Research in S. Africa CAPRISA
Harvard School of Public Health/Tanzania: Dar es Salaam - Muhimbili University of Health & Allied Sciences
Duke University/Tanzania: Moshi - Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Center
Johns Hopkins School of Public Health/Thailand: Bangkok - Chiang Mai University
Case Western Reserve University/Uganda: Kampala - Joint Clinical Research Centre
Uganda: Mulago Hospital Complex
University of Alabama at Birmingham/Zambia: Lusaka - Centre for Infectious Disease Research in Zambia

Wow! Here is a profile of a WOMAN who is taking the Fogarty Fellowship on. She is an M.D./Ph.D. student at VCU School of Medicine/Medical College of Virginia who is a Fogarty Fellow. I love the way that she describes the program and how she is combining clinical research and her interest in global health:

During her year abroad, Kuchta will partner with Taufiqur Rahman Bhuyian, an M.Sc./Ph.D. candidate from the University of Gothenburg in Sweden, and they will be mentored by Stephen Calderwood, M.D., with the Harvard Medical School, and Firdausi Qadri, Ph.D., with the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Diseases Research.

The team’s lab work will focus on understanding the body’s immune cell response - findings that could one day help researchers develop a vaccine against cholera. Kuchta hopes to become a physician-scientist in the field of global medicine.

Win a Trip with Nicholas Kristof!

2009-12-29T17:37:00.000-08:00

So I have to admit that Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn really won me over with Half the Sky. I brought the book advance before it even came out because I am really obsessed with the topic of international women's health. The Fall 2009 semester came and it was a mega doozy so I really only began to read this book seriously this winter break. I finished it and I LOVED this book. It was great because it was organized with anecdotes of Nick and Sheryl's actual experiences and women that they met as journalists. Then what I liked is that it went beyond this and also included information about people making a difference and felt like it was about empowerment and about starting a movement towards real change.

Anyway so I was looking at Nick's blog for the New York Times called, On the Ground, that I also posted on here. It was great because there is where I found out about this opportunity! You should definitely apply! Last years candidate was a medical student and it seemed like she had a great and eye opening experience travelling with Nick Kristof. I am going to see if I can find her email or something so I can maybe interview her for this blog to find out what that experience was like.

For now check this opportunity out! I think all you AMWA members out there should apply for this. There is so much good that you could do with such an opportunity:

1) It is an all expenses paid trip to not meet women abroad and find out what are the things that are going on in their lives

2) It is also an opportunity probably to make a direct difference in the lives of these women because although Nick Kristof is a journalist it seems like he always takes some sort of action in these most dire situations

Volunteer with Largest Global Health Conference

2009-12-29T17:29:00.000-08:00

The largest global health organization is the Global Health Council. I do not have alot direct experience with this organization but I know that they do alot and that there annual conference is the largest global health conference. Here is some information on how to volunteer at the conference from the website:

The Helping Handz Conference Volunteer program, now in its 37th year, is an important opportunity for Council members to directly contribute to the overall success of the conference program.

Student and professional volunteers assist in a number of conference administrative duties that are essential to daily conference operations.

Why Volunteer?

Interact and network with more than 2500 global health and development specialists from over 85 countries
Limited hours of service (8-10 minimum) allow you to make a significant contribution to the overall success of the conference, while being able to participate in sessions and events
Meet new colleagues and have fun
Receive a substantial registration discount
Who Should Volunteer?
All individuals with an interest in global health – students are especially encouraged to apply.
It's a benefit of Council membership! You must be or become a current Council member in order to volunteer. Non-members are not eligible, but may choose to become new members. If your organization is a member with an organizational dues level of $1,050 or above, you may qualify to become a member at no additional cost to you. Questions: Contact Kelly Gardner, Membership Assistant via e-mail at membership@globalhealth.org.

Student Members: It's like having a backstage pass!
This is a great opportunity to take advantage of the additional networking and learning opportunities that being a volunteer provides.

Groups of students from universities, schools of public health and student organizations are encouraged to volunteer.

Thanks so much to Misty for passing this on!

MSF Global Health Film Event this Monday in Theatres

2009-12-11T16:50:00.000-08:00

Check out the new Medicins San Frontiers (Doctors without Borders) trailer for their upcoming Film Event titled "Living in Emergency". It will be playing in theatres this Monday December 14, 2009 only. It will be an interesting look at global health career as lived on the ground. I could recognize Liberia (where I was born) in the trailer so I am assuming that at least some of it will be about the Liberian civil war. And it is. Tickets are available from the website, it is only a one day theatre showing so make sure to get your tickets soon!

Here is some information about the film:

"Filmed in the war-zones of Liberia and Congo with unprecedented access to the field operations of Doctors without Borders/Medecins San Fronteres (MS), LIVING IN EMERGENCY follows four volunteer doctors as they struggle to provide emergency medical care under extreme conditions.

Two volunteers are new recruits: a 26-year old Australian doctor stranded in a remote bush clinic and an American surgeon struggling to cope under the load of emergency cases in a shattered capital city.

Two others are experienced field hands: a dynamic Head of Mission, valiantly trying to keep morale high and tensions under control, and an exhausted veteran who has seen too much horror and wants out.

Admist the chaos, each volunteer must contront the severe challenges of the work, the tough choices and the limites of their own idealism.

The film is arw and very real depiction of the dilemmas facing MSF staff in the feild and the toll their work can take on them both personally and professionally. It is not a pretty film about MSF heroes or heroines. It is about the reality of aid work- blood and sweat, tough decision snad hard consequences, laughter and tears, cagarettes and beer, arguments and all."

AMWA National Conference 2010

2009-12-09T19:29:00.000-08:00

The AMWA National Conference 2010 will be held on March 26-28, 2010 in Washington DC. It will be a great opportunity for students and there will be student specific programming. The student track looks like it will be AMAZING and if you notice there will be a special session on AMWA Global Health Initiatives. Check out the website:

http://www.bioconferences.com/Conferences/WomensHealth/index.aspx

Please take the time to look through the schedule for the Student Track (taken from the conference website):

AMWA ANNUAL CONFERENCE 2010
OPTIONAL STUDENT TRACK
Saturday, March 27
Choice of Student Sessions or Women’s Health Congress Sessions
7:00am Congress Breakfast Symposium 8:30 - 9:00am Welcome & Opening Remarks – AMWA Student Track 9:00 -10:00am Keynote Speaker: "How to Balance It All"
10:00 -10:15am Break
10:15 -10:45am How to be Successful in your Academic Years
10:45 -11:15am How to be Successful in your Clinical Years
11:15am -12:00pm AMWA Partnerships: Building Bridges
12:00 -1:30pm Lunch and Student Elections
1:30 - 2:30pm AMWA Global Health Initiatives
2:30 - 3:15pm Managing the Cost of a Medical Education
3:15 - 3:30pm Break
3:30 - 4:30 pm The Hostile Work Environment: Gender Discrimination and
Sexual Harassment
4:30 - 4:45pm AWMA Incentives and Benefits
4:45 - 5:00pm Adjourn
5:30 - 6:30pm Mentoring Reception 7:00pm AMWA 95th Anniversary and Awards Gala
Student Quilt Presentation

Medical Women's International Conference (MWIA) w/ Student Programming

2009-12-09T19:02:00.000-08:00

Check this out! It is the Medical Women's International (MWIA) Convention and it will be held in Munster, Germany on July 27 to July 31, 2010. The focuses of this year's conference, taken from their website will be:

Main topics of the meeting

The international scientific committee chose 4 main topics for the meeting in 2010. We felt that these would depict important global issues and would be of interest of medical doctor from all over the world too. These are: gender strategies, addiction, epidemic plagues and nutrition. Invited talks will cover topics such as gender strategies, gender based war violence, the addictive brain, internet addiction, TB-globalization and resistances, gender inequality and HIV prevention strategies, selfish brain: the origin of obesity and interventions for preventing obesity in children. More information you can find here.
Bettina Pfleiderer, 2009-09-06 13:10:00

What is even better is that there will be Student Programming specifically geared towards students (taken from the 2010 MWIA convention Student Page):

A special committee dedicated to young doctors and medical students has just started to plan various exciting activities for the world congress 2010 and will organize a special plenary session for young doctors and medical students, a special guided poster tour, as well as an informal get-together in a typical student pub. In the organizing team are a medical student, Katharina- Schütte-Nüttgen and three young medicals doctors themselves, namely Anne Grund M.D., Heike Beckmann M.D., and Inke Dönch M.D., and for the LOC, Bettina Pfleiderer (chairwomen of the International scientific committee). They are looking forward to seeing you in Münster!

There is options to get funding covered for lodging. This is definitely a great opportunity for all AMWA members. I know that AMWA student Executive Committee is working on expanding some opportunities with this conference, so keep looking out for information about that.

The Lancet Student Edition

2009-12-07T15:34:00.000-08:00

I do not get to visit my favorite global health student magazine as much as I want to but it is awesome and I would like to share it with you. The Lancet Student is a great global health resource. Check it out at http://www.thelancetstudent.com/.

Please feel free to come back and comment so I can know what you think about it.

Enjoy!

Women Deliver Conference Scholarship!

2009-11-28T21:17:00.000-08:00

Women Deliver is an awesome conference on international women's health and rights that is held every year, please check them out at their website: http://www.womendeliver.org.

It is definitely something that I have always wanted to attend and I think I might even get a fighting chance this year with the new scholarship program they started. You should definitely apply too! The site specific for the scholarship is (http://www.womendeliver.org/conference2010/scholarship.htm)

Women Deliver 2010 Conference Scholarships

Women Deliver is committed to making Women Deliver 2010 accessible to individuals from all over the world, and will offer full conference scholarships to selected candidates. Scholarships will cover: conference registration, roundtrip airfare, visa fees, hotel stay, and a stipend for incidentals and meals. (For travel reimbursement, please maintain actual and valid receipts of all transactions including visa fees, taxi rides, etc).

DEADLINE: Women Deliver must receive your completed application online on or before the deadline of December 15, 2009.

Please click here to fill out the entire online application.

Good luck to us all! Let me know if you get it too because that would be pretty awesome.

Americans for UNFPA

2009-11-28T20:56:00.000-08:00

Check this out! The organization Americans for UNFPA is an amazing resource. They have a boat load of information on how to get involved in reproductive health issues internationally on their website.

Here is a link to their website:
htt://www.americansforunfpa.org

They also have a youtube page with super sweet videos:
http://www.youtube.com/americansforunfpa

They are also offering this amazing opportunity for non-graduating college students. I am not sure if medical students can apply but I would send over an email just to check because they may be eligible too. This would be a great resource either way:

Student Award for the Health and Dignity of Women
Presented by Americans for UNFPA
The Student Award for the Health and Dignity of Women will recognize one student who demonstrates commitment to women’s health and/or the promotion of the rights of women.

AWARD
The winner will:
1.Travel with Americans for UNFPA staff for five days (approximately) in the Summer of 2010 to visit UNFPA-supported field programs.
2. Win a $1,000 scholarship.
3.Guest-blog on a leading publication website about your trip, and participate in media interviews.
4.Lobby your Representatives in Congress about the need for U.S. support for UNFPA.
5.Host an on-campus awareness-building event about global women’s health and dignity in the semester after you return from your trip. Americans for UNFPA staff will work with you to help prepare for this event and for your lobby visits to local elected officials.

Applicants should:
* Hope to improve the ways that government agencies, non-profit organizations or educational institutions support the health and dignity of women;
* Have community service or extra curricular experiences that demonstrate an interest in collaboration, activism, leadership and/or global change; and
* Be a culturally sensitive, open-minded, team player with values consistent with UNFPA’s mission.

ESSAY QUESTIONS (PLEASE WRITE TWO SEPARATE SHORT ESSAYS)
1. Discuss why the American people and our government should support UNFPA’s work towards ONE of its global goals -

* Please focus on ONE of the following goals of UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund: access to contraception for all women, global maternal survival programs (such as midwife training) OR ending culturally-accepted violence against women. (300-600 words).

2.Discuss how you personally hope to play a role in improving the rights and health of women worldwide, and how visiting UNFPA programs firsthand would make you a better advocate than you currently are. (250-500 words).

I took that info off their website. Anyway check them out its a great organization.

Nicholas Kristof Columns

2009-11-17T10:20:00.000-08:00

Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn have just released the book Half The Sky which is about international women's health, women in development and gender equality. If you are interested in these issues you should definitely check it out, I would like to post a blog post about the book once I finish it.

For now I am going to post a link to Nicholas Kristof's New York Times column which is offers a weekly story relating to global health and particularly women's issues.

HIV/AIDS #1 Killer of Women Worldwide

2009-11-14T17:48:00.000-08:00

Crossposted at Amplify.

According to the Boston News, the World Health Organization (WHO) released some startling news on women and HIV/AIDS as World AIDS Day approaches on December 1, 2009:

GENEVA - In its first study of women’s health, the World Health Organization said yesterday that the AIDS virus is the leading cause of death and disease among women between the ages of 15 and 44.

I find this news to be both unsettling and surprising because although I had recognized the feminization of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, I had never expected it to become the number one cause of death, globally. For us advocates out there I take this as yet another sign that we really need to step up our game in terms of addressing this problem in cohesive, well-planned interventions that are gender mainstreamed. If we approach the HIV from this perspective we could hopefully also understand some of the underlying gender inequities that are fueling this epidemic in women.

The article lists the main reasons for these infections are unprotected sex which many women globally can not negotiate using protection or even consent to the act in the first place. When women are so devalued in society where they do not have control over decisions regarding their own bodies it is no surprise that HIV/AIDS rates are on the rise. (And yes that includes US in the United States- are we not in the process of drafting healthcare reform that bans a woman's access to abortion services???) .

Perhaps my favorite part about this announcement by the WHO is how they managed to draw a clear connection between this pandemic and gender inequality that leads to lack of access for women to contraception, sexual health education and general finanacial independence and empowerment:

“Women who do not know how to protect themselves from such infections or who are unable to do so face increased risks of death or illness,’’ WHO said in a 91-page report. “So do those who cannot protect themselves from unwanted pregnancy or control their fertility because of lack of access to contraception.’’

The data were included in a report on the unequal health treatment faced by girls and women.

Dr. Margaret Chan, the WHO chief, said women enjoy a biological advantage because they tend to live six to eight years longer than men. But in many parts of the world, they suffer serious disadvantages because of poverty, poorer access to health care, and cultural norms that put a priority on the well-being of men, she said.

I think this was a well-thought out release by the World Health Organization but at the same time I am also hoping that this disturbing news will push along the development of microbicides that are a more woman-controlled HIV protection method.

The bottom line here in my opinion is that although it is quite unfortunate that the world has set back and allowed HIV to have such a firm grasp on so many women around the world we would hope that it has also taught us the importance and downstream effects of gender inequality. Some brush off gender inequality and feminism as things of the past but I think think they are definitely still with us and serve a crucial function. Gender inequity is not just what is keeping women from meeting their potential but it also effects those who rely on these women for their services, labor and time such as husbands, children and governments.

I beileve that Nicholas Kristoff and Sheryl WuDunn were right in their book, Half the Sky, if we can not prioritize women we are not going to get to the level of development and health improvements that we are seeking. Women are half of societies and they needed to be treated as equals if real progress in society is to be made.

Engeye Health Clinic

2009-11-14T17:43:00.000-08:00

Welcome to AMWA Student Global Blog!

2009-11-14T17:40:00.001-08:00

The American Medical Women's Association is proud to present the AMWA Student Global Blog! We are hoping to provide you with an interactive format that will feature columns on issues of interest as well as AMWA institutional updates.

Please know that you can participate at anytime by forwarding your submissions to the blog in the following ways:

(1) By emailing your submission to
vanessaaishacoleman@gmail.com

(2) By commenting

(3) By going into the settings and requesting to be a contributor.

We look forward to hearing from you and to this amazing new opportunity.