1.) How do you define a core competency?

CASE DESCRIPTION

You have just arrived in an impoverished underserved East African country where you have been assigned to work by an NGO. You will be in this country for the next 3 months dividing your time between providing primary care at a rural clinic that serves an extremely poor population of farmers, and developing a health education intervention to prevent the spread of malaria. The clinic is staffed by one local physician. He has been working at this clinic since he graduated medical school 16 months ago. He speaks broken English. All of your patients speak a local dialect. The trip to the clinic, where you will also be living, is 75 kilometers and a 3-hour drive. There are some dirt roads that lead to your clinic but most patients arrive on foot. The clinic building is one of only a few that has electricity and running water.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

2.) Have any of you experienced similar situations?

What were you able to achieve while you were there?

3.) What skills do you think you will need to best complete your project?

WHAT DO THE EXPERTS SAY?

Jeffrey Sachs, PhD
Title

Holly Atkinson, MD
President, Physicians for Human Rights

Rick Brennan, MD
Director of Health Unit, International Rescue Committee

Ron Waldman, MD, MPH
Founder and Former Director, Mailman School of Medicine Program on Forced Migration and Health

Ralph Corey, MD
Director, Hubert-Yeargan Center for Global Health

Michele Barry,MD
Director, International Health Program, Yale University School of Medicine

Mori Morikawa, MD
Director, International Health Program, Department of Family Medicine, Case Western Reserve University

Jack Geiger, MD
Director, Program in Health, Medicine and Society, City College of New York

CONSENSUS COMPETENCIES

1.) Tropical Medicine and Infectious Disease
2.) Epidemiology and Basic Clinical Research Skills
3.) Maternal, Reproductive, Neonatal and Child Health
4.) Health Inequity, Cultural Competency and Human Rights
5.) Needs Assessment + Practice in Under-Resourced Settings