Ungweru “Hope in the light”
The Fife Malawi ENT Project

The Ear Nose and Throat Department in Fife, Scotland has developed a partnership with our colleagues in Blantyre, Malawi. Malawi , in Africa, is a country of similar size to Scotland with 15 million residents. Malawi is one of the world’s poorest nations. Currently the ENT needs of the population are served by 1 consultant surgeon, 2 junior doctors in training and 2 clinical officers within the Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital in Blantyre and 15 clinical officers in the district hospitals. There are no trained ENT nurses.

Our first priority is the Nursing training: We propose a training scheme which would include bringing nursing staff, 2 at a time, to the Fife department for a period of 3 months where specialised ENT training would be undertaken in the ward, clinic and theatre environments. Nurses from Fife would then return with them to Blantyre for 2-4 weeks to support them to put in to practice the skills learned.
In time we hope to support these nurses to provide an in house training scheme.

Alongside the nurse training programme we will be sponsoring one of the registrars to come to the UK for a period of training with the aim of training him to be Malawi's first ear surgeon. We will also be facilitating training for the clinical officers by providing ENT teaching weeks while in Blantyre.

Longterm our goal is to create sustainable ENT training and services in Malawi and facilitate the Malawian Ministry of Health 5 year plan for ENT.

Funding needs and timescale–we estimate that we can achieve these goals over a 3 year period for £15.000 per year. We aim to raise some of the money ourselves but are also approaching industry for sponsorship which the Scottish Government have pledged to double.