Long‐term educational program to limit the burden of neurological disorders in Sub‐Saharan Africa: report from an Italy−Mozambique cooperation on epilepsy in children

Pandemics and Burden of Stroke and Epilepsy in Sub-Saharan Africa: Experience from a Longstanding Health Programme

“…More than 10,000 African personnel, including clinical officers, doctors, nurses, biologists, laboratory technicians, administrators, home care assistants, and computer experts, have been trained by DREAM in over 120 local training courses [58-61] (Figure 8). This health workforce makes it feasible to scale-up health programmes for conditions that need continuous care, such as HIV and many NCDs, including stroke and epilepsy [42,[60][61][62][63]. The trained personnel routinely check blood pressure, glucose, and BMI in all DREAM patients, and thousands of patients suffering from arterial hypertension and diabetes regularly receive treatment, education on diet, and counselling to avoid smoking and sedentary life to prevent stroke and other cardiovascular diseases.…”

“…Good communication and relationships between local health care workers and specialists offering their advice from Western countries enable telemedicine development in low-income countries [49], and volunteer specialists are offered education in their local context [58, [60][61][62][63].…”

“…In Malawi, DREAM follows 17,280 patients (88% HIV+) in 15 health centres, 6% of the patients are hypertensive, and 1.1% are diabetics (unpublished observation). A neurology programme to prevent stroke and manage epilepsy is active and receives support by European neurologist volunteers [58, [60][61][62]; the cooperation between neurologists, cardiologists, and local health workers at DREAM is the core of the stroke prevention programme. In 2019, a doctor from DREAM-Blantyre spent a training period on epilepsy and general neurology at the Foundation of the Carlo Besta IRCCS Neurologic Institute Milan and is sharing his knowledge in neurology at the country level [87].…”

“…More than 10,000 African personnel have been trained by DREAM (ref. [58-61]).This health workforce makes it feasible to scale-up health programmes for conditions that need continuous care, such as HIV and many NCDs, including stroke and epilepsy[42,[60][61][62][63]. The trained personnel routinely check blood pressure, glucose, and BMI in all DREAM patients, and thousands of patients suffering from arterial hyperten-…”

A multiprofessional approach to teaching child neurology in Africa – a powerful project for local needs and the avoidance of brain drain

“…The article by Leone et al . describes an interesting educational project in Mozambique, a joint project of the Besta Neurological Institute, Milan and the Neuropaediatric and Electroencephalography Unit in Maputo.…”