The Frank Ogden School of Medicine at Hope Africa University is a private medical school in Bujumbura, Burundi currently ranked #1 in the country by the East African Community Accreditation Commission.
Kibuye Hope Hospital in rural Gitega Province is the primary teaching site for FOSOM-HAU and one of three post-graduate medical education sites offering residency positions as well as a transitional year internship. There is currently one full-time, long-term Emergency Physician in Burundi serving at HAU & KHH. In order to increase the specialist coverage for the country of 12.7M people, KHH has started a PGY2 year “pre-residency” in Emergency Medicine wherein the trainees work in the ER, read through a textbook with weekly discussion, and work through EM-specific questions to reveal gaps, hone knowledge, and develop test-taking skills that will permit the first Burundians to seek residency training (outside of Burundi, mostly likely in an anglophone setting given the paucity of training programs in francophone Africa). This year’s pre-resident has already translated the African Federation of Emergency Medicine Handbook from English to French and will be reading Lapostolle “Médecine d’urgences” textbook. As this is the first year of the program, we do not have a track record of success to boast of, but we are hopeful that with this multi-modal learning program (including some targeted simulation training and ultrasound certification minicourses), we will produce the first Burundian ER doctors.