Global Health Symposium 2016–Global Crises: Today’s Response, Tomorrow’s Hope

The University of Wisconsin-Madison Global Health Institute (GHI) welcomes Dr. Mohammed Dalwai, a Médicins sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) veteran, South African emergency physician and tech innovator, as the keynote speaker for the 2016 Global Health Symposium—Global Crises: Today’s Response, Tomorrow’s Hope.

The 12th annual symposium convenes at 4:30 p.m. Wednesday, March 30, in the Health Sciences Learning Center. The event annually attracts about 300 participants. It is hosted by GHI with support from the UW-Madison International Division and Lectures Committee

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The event is free and open to the public, but registration is required for planning.

Almost 40 live and poster presentations about UW-Madison global health projects will show the breadth of campus global health activity. From clinical medicine to basic science, education to nutrition, and more, students, faculty and staff are working with colleagues in Wisconsin and around the world to improve life for all.

This year, James Conway, GHI associate director for health sciences and professor of pediatrics, will also moderate a Zika Virus Panel that will highlight how researchers across campus are contributing to understanding and stopping the virus. The mosquito-borne virus has spread rapidly in Central and South America and may be connected to birth defects and neurological disorders. Matt Aliota from the School of Veterinary Medicine, Ted Golos from the Schools of Veterinary Medicine and Medicine and Public Health and the Wisconsin Primate Center, and Katie Antony from the School of Medicine and Public Health are among the panelists.

“The Global Health Symposium is an opportunity for campus and the community to experience UW’s response to the complex and interlinked determinants of health and disease,” GHI Director Jonathan Patz says. “I am especially excited about our Zika panelists, who are on the front lines of innovative and immediate responses that will benefit human and animal health.

Dalwai brings war, tech experience

Dalwai, co-founder of The Open Medicine Project South Africa, has worked with Medicins sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, Haiti and Sierra Leone, and he is president of MSF Southern Africa. He is collaborating with Janis Tupesis, a faculty member in the UW Emergency Mohammed DalwaiMedicine Department and GHI-Graduate Medical Education liaison, to create a mobile app for emergency medicine.

In his MSF work, Dalwai saw patients die because they were not triaged correctly. His work creating a free mobile triage application earned him recognition as a 2014 TED Fellow and one of the 2014 GOOD 100, a recognition from GOOD magazine. Implementing the mobile app in Western Cape led to an 88 percent improvement in triage completion.

Dalwai and Tupesis will also present “War, Tech and Health: How medicine under fire prompted an app to improve care” at 5 p.m., Thursday, March 31.

Global Health Symposium schedule:

4:30 p.m. Registration/check in and poster viewing, HSLC Atrium

4:45 p.m. Welcome and announcements, Room 1306

5:00 p.m. Keynote address, Room 1306

6:05 p.m./6:25 p.m./ 6:45 p.m. Concurrent oral presentations

  • Developing medical excellence
  • Ensuring food for all
  • Applying global health locally
  • Connecting culture and care
  • Improving health for women/children

7:00 p.m. Zika Virus Panel

Moderator: James Conway, GHI associate director of Health Sciences, professor of pediatrics

Panelists:

  • Matt Aliota, assistant scientist, pathobiological sciences, School of Veterinary Medicine
  • Ted Golos, professor, comparative biosciences, School of Veterinary Medicine, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Wisconsin National Primate Research Center
  • Katie Antony, assistant professor, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology
  •  TBA

8:00 p.m. Poster session and reception

Thanks to our symposium sponsors:

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Funding for the Dalwai lecture was provided by the university Lectures Anonymous Fund.