Undergraduate Medical Education

 
 

Undergraduate Medical Education has been at the heart of the Kolabo partnership and remains the primary educational focus of the project. The curriculum is adapting and evolving constantly to better meet the needs of Tanzanian medical students and an institution with fewer human resources dedicated to clinical psychiatry and education in mental health.

The project has evolved from a pilot in 2016 to a comprehensive course consisting of large group lectures, small groups, clinical presentations and an examination. Currently our medical education intervention and research is focused on building local capacity and seeking innovative ways to deliver a high quality mental health curriculum with limited faculty members. Our goal is to develop a self sustaining UME program in approximately the next 5 years.

Dr. Rachel Grimminck Introducing Small Group Teaching
As one student stated, “I learned that if you work with patients with mental illness, you can become one of them. Seeing our teachers in this session made me learn that I can treat these patients and not become one. There was the belief that you can catch mental illness.

 
 

Post Graduate Medical Education

 
 

Currently there is only one psychiatry residency program in Tanzania located in Dar Es Salaam. It is the hope of our Tanzanian partners that the second residency program will be started in CUHAS, Mwanza Tanzania.

Currently there are two Psychiatrists at CUHAS. They will be able to fully take over the Undergraduate Medical Education Psychiatry teaching when they have approximately five staff including residents.

 
 

Masters of Public Health

 
 

Our team is committed to helping support the CUHAS University Master’s of Public Health Program through dedicated teaching in Mental Health. This training is critical to ensure that Public Health Practioners in Tanzania are informed around mental illness and how they can help their local communities. 

 
 

Scholarships

 
 

Since 2014 Kolabo has been committed to supporting local Tanzanian residents as they work towards their dreams of becoming Psychiatrists. Through the Kolabo Scholarship we have helped fund the training of Dr. Matiko Mwita, now the second staff Psychiatrist of CUHAS University. We are now funding the second recipient, Dr. Catherine Magwiza as she completes her training in Dar Es Salaam. After she finishes her three years of Psychiatric training she will join the CUHAS team and help serve their Tanzanian community.

 

Research

 
 

Research is a pillar amongst the Kolabo team and a key objective for our work. This has been established to ensure that we are using best practices while abroad but also to ensure that our partners are benefiting in a sustainable way. Our work historically has focused on process evaluation and quality improvement. Moving forward, research will be focused on trialing different small group models with the intention of building a sustainable workable model of UME teaching for the CUHAS team in a low human resource setting.