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I suppose I could be accused of banging on too much about doctors volunteering at the end of their career. But now I have another reason.

At my age, I thought the days of national and international meetings were long gone. So, what a surprise to find myself at the Hilton on Park Lane with my wife in a lovely new dress and about 500 of the great and good in medicine, for one of the best evenings of my life.

I’m never quite sure how anybody can afford to live in London. The Hilton does not come cheap but they certainly know how to put on a good do with lashings of champagne and an excellent meal. I was a little nervous about being on the same table as the others who had been shortlisted for the same award as the group I was representing, but the wine flowed and everything was very cordial.

This is the third year of the BMJ Group awards and there are 13 categories, or maybe 12 and one special lifetime award. I was nominated for the “getting evidence into practice” award for the work I did as a VSO volunteer working at International Hospital in Kampala. The story began with Dr Mark Russell, another VSO volunteer, persuading the hospital to build a category 3 TB laboratory. Then my friend Dr Grania Brigden, another VSOer, applied for funding for a research project from a UK charity called Target TB. The funding allowed us to culture the sputum of 500 HIV patients for TB. Culture is rarely done in Uganda because of cost but our MOTS test had been shown to be cheap and quick in Peru. I completed this phase of the work and set up Phase 2 looking at not only culturing but also checking drug sensitivities on a further 300 patients. We were now looking at our own clients using outreach staff and volunteers to find people who had a productive cough for more than 3 weeks. Having proved the test worked, the project has now been handed over to Ugandans and since 2009 over 1000 HIV sufferers have been tested and more than 50% have TB. Fortunately we found a very low incidence of drug resistance.

So there I was, slightly pickled with champagne and thinking about my good friends in Uganda – over 100 Ugandan volunteers, Bosco in the lab, Dr Ian Clarke and Kevin Duffy who run the charity that employed me at International Hospital, Deborah my TB nurse, and Helen and Jemimah who carefully stretched out the funding from Target TB. Suddenly Gavin Esler, who was hosting the evening, announced that they were going to open the envelope to find the winner for my category.

It was a bit like the Oscars, especially as Hugh Grant was sitting on the next table. And the winner is; “Dr Richard Feinmann.” The champagne anaesthetic dramatically disappeared and from the back of the room I went up to receive our prize. I hope I managed to make it clear in my short speech that I was just a small cog in the team and paid tribute to them all but my memory is slightly blurred.

The only downside was that this was a team effort and the team could not be there. All our work was done with charitable monies and getting them all to the Hilton was not possible.

But what a great evening. Thank you BMJ.

The BMJ nominated us winners for the
“Getting Evidence into Practice”
award.

The TB Diagnostics Lab was the very first project that I became involved in at International Medical Foundation, back in 2007. I remember being approached almost every day by Dr. Mark Russell (a VSO volunteer) who wanted to do something for the many HIV/AIDS patients that he was needing to treat for TB. He had come across a new diagnostic method, *MOT – MODS, that had recently been used in Peru and he thought it would be perfect for Africa; and so it began.

Dr. Ian Clarke offered some space and building resources for a new lab at International Hospital Kampala and agreed that Bosco, one of the hospital’s microbiologists, could allocate some of his time to working with Mark.

I had just started Suubi Trust and agreed that we would raise the £15,000 that was needed to equip the new lab.

The lab was opened on Wednesday August 1st, 2007.

In Q4 2007, Dr. Grania, also from VSO, took over from Mark and started to work with Bosco and the IHK team to perform the clinical trail to validate the methodology and local processes. Early in 2008 this trail received a huge boost when the team secured additional funding from Target TB.

In 2009 Dr. Richard, VSO, joined the team and helped Dr. Edith and Bosco to complete the trial. In August 2009 he helped to train local volunteers, CATTS as we started Phase 2 of the programme, with a particular focus on treatment in the community.

Then in March 2011 we heard that we had been shortlisted for the BMJ award.

It’s been a great team effort. On hearing the news Grania said: “The TB team at IHK should be very proud of themselves, they have worked very hard and its great that their hard work has been publicly recognised.”

Dr. Richard and his wife Pat were able to attend and collect the award:

“This award is for all the Ugandan volunteer workers and village health workers who worked so hard with us to improve the lot of their community.  In a land where this is so much unemployment and pitiful wages this a completely different ‘Big Society’ “

This is a programme that we can all be very proud of. For me it was great to be involved at the very start. Thanks to Mark and the original Suubi Trust sponsors who helped to get us started. Thanks to Target TB for its support of the clinical trial. Thanks to VSO for encouraging doctors to come here and help.

Most of all thanks to Bosco, Edith and the Touch Namuwongo team for the daily implementation of health education, preventative measures, diagnostics and treatment, which is making a huge difference in the lives of those living with HIV/AIDs and TB.

*Microscopic Observed Technique (MOT) is a low-technology, low cost ($5) liquid culture-based methodology performed directly on sputum samples to diagnose Tuberculosis. It is simple to implement, especially in the developing world, and the programme is now run by Ugandan doctors, clinical officers, TB nurses and an increasing number of trained volunteers. This has led to increased rates of diagnosis and treatment of TB, and opening the doors to better management of TB not only in Uganda but across Sub-Saharan Africa.

Read more about this programme by clicking here.

The first project that Suubi Trust supported was the development of a level 2 bio-containment facility at International Hospital Kampala to provide a MODS TB culture and sensitivity service. That was back in July 2007.

Since then we have completed the clinical trial and are now using the method to help diagnose patients from IHK and from our community programmes such as Touch Namuwongo.

This work has been supported over the last 3 years by a number of dedicated volunteers including Dr. Mark Russell, Dr. Grania Brigden and Dr. Richard Feinmann. They have worked alongside the local team including Dr. Edith and Bosco, who can be seen in the photo working with some cultures.

TB killed an estimated 1.7 million people globally in 2009, it is the biggest killer of HIV/AIDS patients in Africa. This new method helps us to get an accurate and cost-effective diagnosis much more quickly than before; for our TB patients starting the right treatment quickly is very important. You can read more about our work with TB patients by clicking here.

TB is preventable, treatable and curable and yet
it kills close to two million people a year.

Little red rods kill 2 million people every year and we can cure it!

Dr Richard, Bosco and the team at IHK continue their work to validate our implementation of MOT, a new, low cost, diagnostic method which we hope will significantly impact our work, especially among those living with HIV. We are hoping that the validation will be complete by this summer.

You can read more here…

Dr Richard “This is why I am in Uganda…”

Posted in TB Diagnostics and Treatment Tagged: Bosco, Dr. Richard ]]> http://blog.suubitrust.org.uk/2009/03/24/world-tb-day/feed/ 0 Suubi Trust acidfastbacilli.jpg WhyIAmInUganda http://blog.suubitrust.org.uk/2008/06/21/one-year-old/ http://blog.suubitrust.org.uk/2008/06/21/one-year-old/#comments Sat, 21 Jun 2008 19:34:58 +0000 Kevin http://suubitrust.wordpress.com/?p=524 ]]> Suubi Trust is one year old tonight. Earlier today we had our Annual General Meeting at which Steve presented our Financial Summary. In our first year we have raised just over £48,000.

We have been able to support all of the following:

• We established a new TB Lab at the hospital in Kampala and helped to support the work of Dr Mark, Dr Grania and Bosco as they led the way in establishing and validating a new TB diagnostic method, MOTS. Target TB has recently provided a grant to help complete the clinical validation and initial phase of testing and treatments.
• In Lira, Northern Uganda, we have been providing primary healthcare to 250 patients each month since the start of 2008. This work has been supported by St. Peters Methodist School in Canterbury, Aspect Capital, Port-P, Wesleyan Assurance and Kuvuka Coffee. We provided funding for staff to receive training by the Ministry of Health and this team has recently started an immunisation programme for those living in and around Lira (immunisation drugs are supplied by the Ministry). In the second half of 2008, in addition to continuing the work above, we hope to start an HIV-AIDS community outreach programme in which the team will provide voluntary counselling, testing and treatments; in this initiative we are working with Hands of Help.
• We have provided various funding for care given to patients at Hope Ward. These have included a number of surgical procedures and cancer treatments. We have further supported Hope Ward by working with a number of organisations, including Cardiac Report Limited, SonoSite, Inverness Medical UK and Morriston Hospital Swansea, to provide much needed medical equipment; the value of which we estimate to be just over £40,000.
• We have just started a new project in Pader, Northern Uganda, where we are working with the Government to renovate, equip and manage the Health Centre. We are hoping that this facility will become the prime referral centre for this region and be a base from which we can perform community based outreach providing much needed healthcare. If we can find sufficient funding this will include perhaps up to 5 mobile clinics that can reach the most rural areas; this initiative is being heavily supported by Dunavant Cotton, HIPS and USAID.

We are absolutely delighted with the level of support received and want to thank you all so much.

There’s lots more to be done, together we can make a difference.

Please consider helping; you can read more about Giving by clicking here…