AMPATH Nepal recently hosted its first strategic planning workshop with stakeholders from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, Dhulikhel Hospital-Kathmandu University Hospital (DH-KUH), Kathmandu University School of Medical Sciences, AMPATH Kenya partners, and members of the AMPATH Secretariat. This process strengthened a shared vision and defined strategic priorities for work together over the next five years.
Rachel Vreeman, MD, MS, Chair of the Department of Global Health and Health System Design and Director of the Arnhold Institute for Global Health at Icahn Mount Sinai, led us in an exercise to envision together how the partnership can indeed bring “quality health care for all.” We reviewed AMPATH’s vision: “a global partnership to ensure health for all,” which aligns well with DH-KUH’s vision of “quality health care for all.”
Our connection related to care stood out for all of us: Ampath’s motto of “leading with care” and DH-KUH’s motto of “we care” makes care the center of all we do within our partnership. To reach quality health care for all, we wanted to consider together in each of our priorities how to think across the health system from the community to the referral hospital and across the lifespan of the population to holistically address the health needs of the populations we serve.
Leading up to the strategic planning workshop, we identified priorities in care, education, and research based on burden of disease in Nepal, strengths of all partners, and priorities of our Nepal institutional partners and communities. This led us to prioritize noncommunicable diseases (NCDs), attributing to more than 70 percent of deaths in Nepal. Our work over the next five years will start in the community to develop a comprehensive care model to screen, link, treat, and retain patients with NCDs and incorporate guidelines for referrals. With this, we recognize the need to provide the highest quality subspecialty care within DH-KUH to care for those with complications from NCDs.
A drawing Rachel Vreeman, MD, MS, made during the strategic planning meeting in Nepal
Another care priority includes women’s and child health. While there has been success related to antenatal care and increasing institutional births, we still recognize gaps within ongoing postnatal care and child health. We hope to expand some of the Institute’s prior work using the community health worker model in Dolakha to improve outcomes in these areas. Additionally, as DH-KUH develops high-risk pregnancy services, we will work together to support increasing the number of normal deliveries in community facilities, screening for high-risk pregnancies, and guidelines for referrals. The partnership will also include important women’s health issues beyond reproductive health, such as cervical and breast cancer screening and treatment.
The education team meet in Nepal to discuss multilateral exchange programs.
Over the next five years, we will develop adolescent friendly health services to support the needs of adolescents in the communities served by DH-KUH. AMPATH Nepal is already supporting a population-based needs assessment among adolescents. With this data and input from adolescents, we will support trainings and development of adolescent friendly services in the community and at DH-KUH. This will complement the work AIGH is doing globally related to adolescent health.
For each of these care priorities, we need education and research to support their progress and inform future direction. Both our education and research teams worked together to consider how to grow the infrastructure to support multilateral exchanges, workforce development, and research training and capacity.
We not only strengthened our shared vision and defined priorities for the next five years, but also continued to build relationships and trust. We learned from one another and will always remember the wise words from our AMPATH Kenya colleagues—words of encouragement, reminders that, “Sometimes we will win and sometimes we will learn,” and of course, “If we want to walk fast, walk alone; if we want to walk far, walk together.” So, as we consider the first of many strategic plans, more than anything, we are committed to a long-term partnership of walking together to ensure health for all.
Rose House, MD, MS, an Associate Professor of Emergency Medicine and Pediatrics, has served as Nepal Partnership Director since September 2022. She works alongside Nepal colleagues to develop and support our global health partnership between Mount Sinai, Kathmandu University School of Medicine, and Dhulikhel Hospital in Nepal. She also provides education and clinical care in emergency medicine and pediatric emergency medicine.