Preparing for Inspire in Addis

We are now less than a week from the start of our inaugural Inspire Through Clinical Teaching course in Addis Ababa University/Black Lion Hospital, Ethiopia. We will be running two courses back to back, with a faculty development day in between, funded by www.casief.ca. I think we have most things organized before next Tuesday’s start.

Many thanks to Dr Mahder Barahi and Dr Ananya Anate for hosting us in Addis. It’s really exciting to take the course to a new place and I find that the best part of teaching on the course is meeting new people. There’s been a lot of interest in Addis with participants lined up from several different institutions and multiple specialties/professions. I’m also excited to spend a little more time in Addis, CASIEF has been partnered with Addis Ababa University for some years now but I’ve only had the chance to visit once before just last year.

For me two of the key things about the Inspire course is local ownership, and developing a network of medical educators. I’m used to working with Dr Amon Ngongola (see picture) in the pediatric operating rooms at the University Teaching Hospital, Lusaka, Zambia – where he is a pediatric surgeon. Next week he’s travelling (pending visa) to Addis to be the course director for the Inspire course, having been involved in several courses in Lusaka. I’m also looking forward to seeing Dr Mark Gacii again, who is coming to Addis to take the course as a participant. I met Mark in Nairobi last year during another Inspire course, where he runs the WFSA Pediatric Anesthesia fellowship. No doubt potential future Ethiopian faculty will be recruited in the first course next week and will help to co-facilitate the next course, and there is always plenty to learn from course participants.

Finally really glad Dr Sonia Akrimi will be coming for the first course next week, and Dr Purnima Rao for the week after. They both have impressive medical education résumés and are both Inspire course authors. I think we have an ideal mix of medical educators with different levels of experience from diverse backgrounds. Watch this space for more details as the course runs – and I’ll try to post some pictures on the Instagram feed (link at bottom of the page) during the course if I get good enough internet in Addis.

— Dr. Dylan Bould