Dartmouth Coalition for Global Health

Mambo! Greetings from Dar es Salaam!

Thanks to everyone who worked to make this blog possible! It will be an excellent tool for students doing global health work abroad.  Also, DCGHers, great, great work this winter.  I heard the volunteer/internship fair was a real hit!  Really wish I could be there with you guys.

I’m very happy to post a message now at the half-way point of my Tanzanian experience.  I’ll try to keep this post brief, as requested, but I’m sure I will have more to report in the near future!

Brief context: In 2007, the WHO announced a five-year campaign to make essential drugs ‘child-friendly’ for children around the world, particularly in resource-poor regions.  Over the past term and a half, I have been fortunate to work with Professor Sienna Craig, Dr. Lisa Adams, and Dr. Stephen Spielberg (former dean of the Dartmouth Medical School and specialist in pediatric pharmacology) on the beginnings of a multi-site study analyzing drug administration preferences for children.  Simply put, before we improve drug delivery for children, we need to understand the current drug administration preferences of those who most directly address children’s illnesses (ie, doctors, parents, pharmacists, and even traditional healers).

Although our focus is on parents and the ‘formal sector’, namely doctors and pharmacists, I have been doing some undercover work (sort of like James Bond) on the ‘informal sector’, particularly unlicensed pharmacists and traditional healers.  On any given day, one can find me wandering around Dar popping my head into pharmacies, big and small, asking questions and observing.  Pharmacies  in Dar are about as common as Starbucks in the States, so this has kept me busy.  Investigating pharmacies is interesting, but learning about traditional healers, now that’s where it gets good.

I met with an anthropologist, Dr. Kayombo, who is keenly interested in traditional medicine.  Such a joyous man, reminds me a lot of Ambassador Yalowitz.  He spoke to me with a strong accent about one common childhood illness.  Among traditional healers, it is called ‘dege dege’ and has symptoms similar to what conventional medicine would label cerebral malaria.  With a beaming smile, he described the traditional therapy: traditional healers take a powdered form of elephant dung and apply it to the wrists of the sick child.  Pretty sweet huh?

I was fascinated by this discussion with Dr. Kayombo.  He has close friends who are traditional healers and offered to introduce me to some of them.  I haven’t made any official plans here yet, but I will update you guys for sure.  One caveat: the traditional healers only speak Swahili.  I have been taking Swahili lessons since I have arrived in Dar, but I don’t think I’m ready to have a conversation with a traditional healer! 

On the topic, I actually have a Swahili class soon, so I should go now to prepare a bit for that.  I sincerely hope the winter term is going well for all of you back in wintery Hanover!  Keep up all the great work!  And I greatly look forward to reading posts from all of you who are currently doing work abroad!

Much love,

Ben Campbell ‘10