Shafik Dharamsi, an Assistant Professor in the Department of Family Practice, has received the Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies (PWIAS) Visiting Scholar Abroad Award.
Dr. Dharamsi will work with medical faculty in Nepal at the Patan Academy of Health Sciences to develop a long-term international research agenda on social accountability in medicine and the development of socially responsive physicians. He will collaborate with Arjun Karki, Vice Chancellor of the Patan Academy of Health Sciences, and Robert Woollard, a Professor in the Department of Family Practice and international expert in the area of social accountability of medical schools.
Like many countries, and particularly less developed ones, Nepal suffers from gross inequities in health status and healthcare services. Although Nepal is witnessing an explosion of new medical schools, most of them are private, for-profit schools with high tuition fees, and pay little attention to health inequities and the plight of socioeconomically marginalized patients. The Patan Academy of Health Sciences (PAHS) has developed a not-for-profit medical school in affiliation with the Patan Hospital, and has focused on the health of socioeconomically vulnerable citizens in rural areas who have little or no access to care, and the values of service and altruism. Dr. Dharamsi’s work will enable the development of a much needed research program to investigate the impact of the PAHS curriculum on developing socially responsive physicians in Nepal.
The PWIAS Visiting Scholar is expected to undertake outstanding and transformative research which will have an impact in terms of addressing an important science or humanities issue in the host country.