Academic Leads: Prof Paul Garside, Prof Andy Waters, Prof Iain McInnes
Summary
The population in Malawi suffers an excess medical burden arising from infectious and increasingly non-infectious diseases.
The co-existence of multiple diseases in individuals is common in Malawi - termed multi-morbidity, this confers remarkably poorer outcomes across a range of health and social measures.
To address this challenge, we propose the establishment of a world class, internationally accredited Clinical Laboratory Facility at the College of Medicine in Blantyre that will provide a step change in the clinical research capability and capacity in Malawi, be transformative for local health care delivery and lead to a self-sustaining and future proofed translational research programme partnered with government, major funders and the international pharmaceutical industry.
Following the appointment of key strategic personnel (laboratory and commercial managers in Blantyre) an existing building will be renovated to provide state of the art clinical laboratory facilities.
Installation of the latest automated laboratory information and financial management systems will underpin accreditation of the laboratory to international standards.
The new Centre for the Study of Multimorbidity thus created, will then initiate training of local clinicians and allied health professionals and begin to provide clinical service and initial clinical surveys to assess inflammatory NCD burden in Malawi, provide preliminary data to support larger surveys and intervention studies and engagement with pharma.
University of Glasgow (UofG) contact: Alex MacKay
University of Malawi (UofM) contact: Youngson Ghambi
Key people: Dr Mwapatsa Mipando (UofM College of Medicine), Scottish Government International Development Team
Here are some before and after images of a lecture theatre becoming a lab. It's the first of its kind in Malawi and will house state of the art diagnostic testing equipment when complete:
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Jan 2021 Big News! As well as the lab being complete, is the solar power project we are bringing to the lab. Read more...
Even bigger news! The Blantyre Blantyre project has been specially highlighted in a European Commission (Africa Europe Innovation Partnership report) as an exemplar of best practice between Africa & European institutions. Great to have everyone’s hard work on the project acknowledged in this way. Read more...
We also have a lovely new website. Take a look!
