February 2016 Newsletter – Pan-University Network for Global Health

A quarterly newsletter from the Pan University Network for Global Health

Latest PUNGH Activities

Call for Proposals for Capacity Building from PUNGH

Due 1 April
For this round of funding, we are seeking proposals for educational and capacity building activities between network members and institutions. Up to $10,000USD in total has been allocated for these projects; the number of awards will be determined by the budgets of funded projects. It is anticipated that most funded projects will be completed by 1 April 2017. Funds are non-renewable.

Penn State PUNGH, in conjunction with PSU Hershey Medical School, has been hosting an ongoing speaker series entitled Conversations in Global Health. The talks are hosted online between the two campuses and many are available on YouTube for viewing. Speakers present global health research, activities, and campus initiatives. The next talk will be on 3 March by Dr. Alison Gernand, entitled €œPregnancies and Placentas in Bangladesh and Ghana.

The University of Freiburg has recently launched an MSc Global Urban Health Postgraduate Program, beginning in October 2016. For more information, contact Dr. Sonia Diaz-Monsalve (sonia.diaz-monsalve@uniklinik-freiburg.de). This modular course in English is intended for postgraduate students awarding 75 credit points (ECTS). The MSc GUH will be taken as full time study (one academic year). The initial phase will be in Freiburg (9 months) and the subsequent field study (for the MSc thesis) will be done abroad or as desk study in Freiburg. The course includes cross-disciplinary approaches with inputs from several faculties of Freiburg University and external lecturers, organized by the €œCentre for Medicine and Society€ on behalf of the Philosophical Faculty. There will be excursions to Geneva, Basel, Strasburg and other places of interest.

Savitribai Phule Pune University launched a joint center initiative with Penn State University, which opened in September 2015. The launch included a two-day workshop in Pune, with breakout sessions in four thematic areas: global health, infectious disease, social justice, and novel materials. The collaboration is in the process of funding their first round of seed grant proposals.

Interim Director, Rhonda BeLue, Ph.D.

As of 1 January 2016, Dr. Rhonda BeLue has begun her role as the interim director of PUNGH. Dr. BeLue is an Associate Professor of Health Policy and Administration at Penn State. She has an extensive record of research and outreach in health disparities, vulnerable populations, and global health in general. Since the inception of PUNGH, she has been an active member and we welcome her to her new role!

Publications

The network has a forthcoming publication in Globalization and Health on the network structure, logic model, and research priorities. Watch for the online publication sometime in March 2016 as a part of the journals series on Health Partnerships.
Winchester, M; R BeLue; T Oni; U Wittwer-Backofen; D Deobagkar; H Onya; TA Samuels; SA Matthews; C Stone; CO Airhihenbuwa. (forthcoming) The Pan University Network for Global Health: Framework for collaboration and review of global health needs. Globalization and Health.

Global Health Funding Opportunities

Understanding Barriers and Facilitators to Type 1 Diabetes Management in Adults (DP3)

National Institutes of Health
Due 22 June 2016
The goal of this Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) is to support research that will identify barriers and facilitators to good diabetes self-management in adults with type 1 diabetes. The results from this research should inform future intervention research in adults with type 1 diabetes.

Global Noncommunicable Diseases and Injury Across the Lifespan: Exploratory Research(R21)

Department of Health and Human Services
Due 22 Feb 2017
This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) supports planning, design and initial pilots for locally relevant and catalytic research on non-communicable diseases (NCDs) or injury in low and middle-income countries (LMICs). Research addressing multiple NCDs and their risk factors and research addressing NCDs as comorbidities for/with infectious diseases including HIV/AIDS is encouraged. Scientists in the United States (U.S.) or upper middle income countries (UMICs) are eligible to partner with scientists in LMIC institutions.

International Research Scientist Development Award (IRSDA) (K01)

National Institutes of Health
Due 2 March 2016
The purpose of the International Research Scientist Development Award (IRSDA) is to provide support and protected time (three to five years) to advanced postdoctoral U.S. research scientists and recently-appointed U.S. junior faculty (at least two years beyond conferral of doctoral degree) for an intensive, mentored research career development experience in a low- or middle-income country (LMIC) leading to an independently funded research career focused on global health. FIC invites applications from early-career investigators from any health related discipline who propose career development activities and a research project that is relevant to the health priorities of the LMIC.

Planning Grant for Global Infectious Disease Research Training Program (D71)

National Institutes of Health
Due 29 July 2016
This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) invites new planning grant applications for the Global Infectious Disease (GID) Research Training Program from applicants at low- and middle-income research institutions (LMICs). The application should propose plans to develop a collaborative research training program with a U.S. institution that will strengthen the capacity of the applicant institution to conduct infectious disease (excluding HIV/AIDS and select agents) research. Planning grants should describe the planning process and detailed vision for developing a research-training program that focuses on major endemic or life-threatening emerging infectious diseases, neglected tropical diseases, infections that frequently occur as co-infections in HIV infected individuals or infections associated with non-communicable disease conditions in LMICs.

Emerging Global Leader Award (K43)

National Institutes of Health
The purpose of the Fogarty Emerging Global Leader Award is to provide research support and protected time to a research scientist from a low- or middle-income country (LMIC) with a junior faculty position at an LMIC academic or research institution. This intensive, mentored research career development experience is expected to lead to an independently funded research career. This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) invites applications from LMIC scientists from any health related discipline that propose career development activities and a research project that is relevant to the health priorities of their country.

Grand Challenges

Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
Due 11 May 2016
Grand Challenges Explorations fosters early-stage discovery research to expand the pipeline of ideas for solving our greatest global health and development challenges. Launched in 2008 with an initial $100 million commitment from the foundation, Grand Challenges Explorations have already been awarded to more than 1100 researchers from more than 60 countries.

Translation Research Capacity Building Initiative in Low Income Countries (TREIN) (U24)

National Institutes of Health
Due 15 May 2016
The purpose of this Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) is to solicit applications that propose to build in-country capacity through the creation of a trans-disciplinary investigative team to guide the conduct of late-stage translation phase 4 research (T4TR) in low income countries (as defined by The World Bank) through skills development programming, needs assessment, and capacity building. Studies will be required to address chronic non-communicable heart, lung, blood and sleep diseases and disorders in low income countries.

Pilot funding for HIV Research

Penn State Methodology Center
Due 1 April 2016
This funding opportunity provides support for initiating new research collaborations that could lead to a program of significant research and competitive proposals to external agencies. Studies may last up to 12 months, and awards will be given for up to $20,000 to fund salary support, travel, research assistants, and/or necessary supplies.

Global Health Meetings and Workshops

Persistent and Emerging Issues in Population Health Science

Penn State University, 19-21 September 2016
Funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Abstracts due 30 March 2016.

Fourth Global Symposium on Health Systems Research

Vancouver, 14-18 November 2016
The Symposium invites abstracts for organized sessions and individual presentations, linked to various subthemes, due 20 March 2016.

International Conference of the Dakar Institute of African Studies

Dakar, 1-2 July 2016
They invite scholars, artists, activists, and practitioners to submit proposals (no more than 500 words) that explore and/or challenge any perspective on the symposium€™s major theme. Presentations in French or English from the perspectives of anthropology, education, economics, health sciences, history, law, language and literature, philosophy, religion, sociology, and technology, are particularly welcomed, due 15 April.

Oxford Symposium on Population, Migration, and the Environment

Oxford, 21-22 March 2016
This interdisciplinary conference seeks to bring to the table academics and professionals from the realms of economics, education, environmental studies, urban studies, sociology and demography, law, food and agriculture, political science, and ethics, to present papers and engage in discourse relevant to global environmental issues and its effects on human welfare and progress.

International Population Conference

Cape Town, South Africa was selected as the host for the XXVIII International Population Conference, which will take place the week of 29 October to 4 November 2017. Statistics South Africa will be the primary organization hosting the Conference, with support from many other IUSSP members and their institutions in South Africa. Call for papers will be announced in March; deadline for submissions will be December 15, 2016.

NSF Methods Mall

Due 1 March 2016
National Science Foundation- sponsored opportunities for research methods training.

Other Links and Updates

2iE Center in Burkina Faso is home to a Penn State Centre for Collaborative Engagement in the areas of water and environmental engineering. Those interested in collaborating with faculty on global health related projects can contact Jessica Ouedraogo (Jio2@psu.edu)

Penn State PUNGH recently participated in the AESEDA Symposium for Penn State Engagement in Africa.

Dr. Stephen Matthews has been coordinating the development of a new online Certificate and Masters of Professional Service (MPS) in Applied Demography. The Certificate and the MPS will be launched Fall 2016-Spring 2017 via Penn State’s World Campus. The core courses focus on Principles of Demography; Demographic Techniques, Applied Demography, Data, and GIS and Applications in Applied Demography. In addition they are developing courses in areas such as Applied Demography and Public Policy and Applied Demography and Health; and Spatial Demography. All of these courses will include significant international examples, case studies and data. Indeed, as demography is ‘global’ and we are working through the World Campus we are attempting to develop courses for the world market not just US. He is also in the process of developing materials for a new course in fall 2016 on Spatial Inequalities (Sociology 452) at PSU which will explicitly draw on the PUNGH dual themes of urbanization and health

Follow our Twitter page for regular updates on global health events and opportunities.

Future newsletters will feature ongoing PUNGH projects and researchers. To be included in future newsletters or for any questions, contact network coordinator, Dr. Margaret Winchester.

Partner Universities

PUNGH is made up of faculty from six core institutions. See each university’s website for ongoing local activities.

The Inaugural Global Health Workshop – Final Report

The Inaugural Global Health Workshop

Penn State University
May 14-16, 2014
Final Report (PDF Version of the Inaugural Global Health Workshop Final Report)

Network Name

  • The Pan University Network for Global Health

At the conclusion of the global health workshop, participants agreed to turn this into a network of participating institutions with two priorities:

  1. Urbanization and Health
  2. Intersection of Infectious Diseases and Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs)

Why did we need a global health workshop?

The Pennsylvania State University (PSU) has begun developing its next five year strategic plan. In our current plan, the University Office of Global
Program (UOGP) at Penn State rolled out a vision of globalizing the University through the creation of a Global Engagement Network (GEN). Over the past
five years, UOGP made significant strides toward establishing GEN. To date, there are about a dozen GEN partnerships with key university partners in
different parts of the world and in various stages of development. More than half are already active while others are making good progress. Many of
partners expressed interest in moving beyond bilateral partnerships and developing a true global network. As a result, the plan over the next five years is
to strengthen GEN geographic partnerships and build a collaborative network through a thematic focus. One of these key themes is global health. Other
themes include energy, food security/sovereignty and climate change/adaptation. In addition to the present geographic GEN partnerships, the thematic foci
will facilitate an easier connecting point for new faculty as well as a means of connecting with some other external networks. As a part of this strategic
direction, in January 2013, Penn State President Rod Erickson led a delegation to meet with his counterpart at the University of Cape Town, Vice Chancellor
Max Price. One of the results of that meeting was an agreement to support joint efforts to organize a global health workshop in which several other
universities would be invited. This meeting in May 2014 was PSU first thematic GEN global health workshop.

According to the Consortium of Universities for Global Health, “Global Health is improving the economic, social, and environmental conditions people live
in, and eliminating avoidable disease, disability, and death.” Another way of stating this is that any other challenges we have as a society, nationally or
globally, cannot be fully addressed until success results in improved health conditions of individuals, families, and communities. It is also worth noting
that multidisciplinary collaboration, which is the hallmark of the GEN strategy, is the most promising approach to addressing global health and other
global challenges. In the current United Nations efforts to plan for post 2015 Millennium Development Goals, global partnerships to address NCDs has become
a critical goal to effectively respond to the complex global challenges of which inequity in health remains a persistent challenge.

The global health workshop began with an initial focus on three priority areas:

  1. Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs). The NCD burden, which includes conditions such as hypertension, stroke, and diabetes, is outstripping infectious
    disease in the global south.
  2. Capacity Building. It has been emphasized that building capacity in terms of well-equipped local researchers and service providers is a key to bridging
    the inequity in global health.
  3. Technology and Innovation. Research on disease prevention and management can benefit from technological innovation both in data collection and analysis
    as well as efficient access to care and management of chronic conditions. The role of technology in producing and sharing knowledge globally has
    possibilities and challenges that we wanted to examine during our meeting.

What were the objectives for the workshop?

Given the shared tripartite mission of research, teaching and service/outreach, we want to use lessons learned from the workshop to build research
partnerships that could focus on short term and mid/long term goals:

Short term – End of workshop

  1. Agree on 2-3 key global health themes for multi-institutional partnerships with multidisciplinary scholars.
  2. Begin to outline concepts for a proposal related to each theme.
  3. Develop a white paper that signals the importance of this topic for higher education in global health and the commitment of the various participating
    partners.

Mid/Long term – the next 6-12 months

  1. Develop plans for select global health pilot projects to be supported by participating institutions.
  2. Plan a follow up meeting to be hosted by one of the participating institutions to report on pilot project plans and develop multi-year proposals for
    funding.

Participating institutions

Invitations went to 15 universities that were part of the PSU GEN. Eight of the original 15 universities invited responded positively to the invitation.
These institutions represented PSU partners with whom we currently have a ‘GEN’ partnership or are in process of finalizing one. Two additional
universities were invited. These universities represented disadvantaged populations in their country or region. They were not a part of the official PSU
GEN but PSU faculty and academic units either had a partnership with them or were exploring partnerships. Overall, there were a total of 32 faculty and
researchers from 10 universities across the globe. Thus the final participating universities were:

GEN Partners (signed MOUs)

  • University of Pune, India
  • IIT Madras, India
  • Sungkyunkwan University, South Korea
  • University of Freiburg, Germany
  • University of Cape Town, South Africa

GEN Partners (collaborations and discussions already underway, but not yet an MOU)

  • University of Guanajuato, Mexico
  • Utrecht, Netherlands
  • University of the West Indies

Additional Institutional Partners

  • University of Limpopo, South Africa (hosts to PSU’s global health minor students during six-week summer internships)
  • International Institute for Water and Environmental Engineering, Burkina Faso

Other organizations represented

We also had participants from three universities in the US and three private and philanthropic organizations. The US universities were the University of
Michigan, New York University Langone Medical Center, and the University of Minnesota. The private organizations were UNICEF, Merck, and Highmark.

Penn State participants

There were 30 faculty researchers from Penn State who participated in the three day workshop. They included faculty in such fields as prevention science,
biobehavioral health, demography, medicine, and law.

What did we talk about at the workshop?

The structure of the workshop was such that there were limited formal speeches and more time devoted to small group discussions. Penn State leadership
offered welcoming remarks prior to brief introductory presentations by each of the 10 universities from outside the US. A keynote address was delivered by
Dr. Rafael Obregon of UNICEF. He focused his remarks on the UN goals and strategy to tackle the increased global burden of NCDs particularly in the global
south and UNICEF’s plans to address the increasing burden of NCDs particularly among children and young people since this burden has increased among them
and they are often left out of the discussion about NCDs. Following the keynote remarks, six preassigned working groups began their deliberations.

With the understanding that research and training/education are best addressed via a global collaboration, each group reviewed the topics below with the
goal of identifying the topics with the greatest interest and opportunities:

  1. Urbanization and its impact on global health
  2. Cultural contexts of behavior and the modality of health service delivery
  3. Environmental factors including social and structural determinants of health
  4. Bio-psycho-social concepts of health in urban areas
  5. Fostering a culture of promoting adherence to evidence based standards of care with regular monitoring and evaluation
  6. Exposure to continuous stress, pollutants and toxic substances
  7. Integrating biomedicine with other modalities such as Ayurveda, Yoga, etc
  8. An equitable engagement around global health through interdisciplinary research approaches and academic exchange
  9. Food and water security and sovereignty
  10. Environmental determinants of health such as climate change

An initial reporting of the groups led to the two priority areas. In the final day, the six groups were collapsed into 3 groups to further discuss the
priorities areas.

Recommendations

The final recommendation was that the network would focus on two priorities areas which clearly can benefit from a network of global institutions since a
single institutional approach is not likely to yield sustainable impact on these global health challenges. These priorities are:

A. The intersection of infectious disease and NCDs

B. Urbanization and health

Addressing these two priorities would demand an interdisciplinary and multi-institutional model to stimulate innovation and synergy that would influence
the overall framing of research questions as well as the integration and coordination of research. Innovation and synergy should inform new thinking,
conceptually, methodologically, and substantively to tackle the complex patterns of, and processes underlying, the intersection of infectious disease and
NCDs, on the one hand, and the dimensions of spatial inequality in a rapidly changing urban environment, on the other. Below are synopses of the two
priorities.

Intersection of Infectious disease and NCDs

The conventional dichotomy in disease classification masks the pattern and the severity of disease burdens, particularly in the global south. In this
dichotomy, diseases are typically classified into infectious or chronic and communicable or non-communicable. The experience of many researchers and
practitioners today is that the burden of multiple diseases challenges us to critically examine the utility of the disease classification. For example,
HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and some forms of cancer are both infectious and chronic. They may start out as an infection but successful treatment, coupled with
co-morbidity experienced by individuals who are burdened by these diseases, compel us to think about a different strategy for addressing this global health
challenge. Indeed, HIV positive patients seem to experience obesity and cardiovascular diseases, heart disease and stroke. For example, it has been
observed that people who are on ARV/HAART often experience lipodystrophy, also called fat redistribution. In fact this dual burden is common in people with
HIV and AIDS. A disorder of adipose (fatty) tissue is characterized by a selective loss of body fat in which patients with lipodystrophy have a tendency to
develop insulin resistance, diabetes, a high triglyceride level (hypertriglyceridemia), and fatty liver. There are numerous forms of lipodystrophy that are
genetic (inherited) or acquired (not inherited). One current study in South Africa is looking at lipodystrophy for a better understanding of the
intersection between infectious disease and diabetes, a common NCD globally.

Urbanization and Global Health

In 2008 the planet’s population became 50.01% urban and the percent of the population that is urban is expected to rise to 60% by 2030. Some part of the
global south is already highly urbanized so their urban share is not projected to increase substantially (e.g., Latin America is almost 70% urban). The
urban population in the global south will nearly double in 25 years (approx. 2 billion today to over 3.5 billion by 2040). Urban population growth will
have a direct impact on global health, and this growth will be burdened with uneven development and the persistence of urban spatial inequality, including
health disparities. Climate change, food, water, and health care are essential to the human condition and the inequity gap in the distribution of these
basic resources, goods, and services is projected to widen—especially in urban areas– unless some urgent actions are taken as multinational and
multidisciplinary collectives.

Call for Capacity Building Seed Grants

PAN UNIVERSITY NETWORK FOR GLOBAL HEALTH (PUNGH)
CALL FOR CAPACITY BUILDING SEED GRANTS
DUE 1 APRIL 2016 (PDF Version)

The Pan University Network for Global Health (PUNGH) announces the availability of pilot funding for network member institutions to conduct educational and capacity building activities.

Founded in 2014, PUNGH consists of six founding member institutions and faculty researchers. For more information, see https://sites.psu.edu/globalhealthnetwork. The network focus includes two priority areas:

  1. Urbanization and Health
  2. Intersection of Infectious Diseases and Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs)

In late 2014, pilot funding was awarded to research projects within these thematic areas. To expand network impact and activities, this round of funding is to develop educational and research capacity through the network themes. Potential projects include course development, training modules, reciprocal methods exchange, or other activities that utilize member expertise and build local capacity in an assessable way.

Funding Type

For this round of funding, we are seeking proposals for educational and capacity building activities between network members and institutions. Up to $10,000USD in total has been allocated for these projects; the number of awards will be determined by the budgets of funded projects. It is anticipated that most funded projects will be completed by 1 April 2017. Funds are non-renewable.

Projects should relate to the network themes and engage multiple network institutional and individual members. Projects should lead to future projects and should include potential sources for subsequent funding.

The intent of these funds is to encourage new partnerships within the network. Faculty from participating network institutions may apply. If there are existing international partnerships involving two institutions, a minimum of one additional network institution must be proposed. If this proposal is for a new partnership, two institutions from different countries are adequate. Due to funding restrictions for this round of funding, teams must include one Penn State investigator.

Proposals are due 1 April 2016. Email questions and proposals to winchester@psu.edu.

PROPOSAL

All proposals should be a maximum of four (4) pages, not including the timeline and budget. Proposals should be collated into a single pdf file, with the primary applicant’s surname in the file name.

  1. Abstract (no more than 250 words): The abstract should give a layperson’s overview of the project, including the purpose and goals. This abstract will be posted on the network web portal.
  2. Specific Aims and Rationale (1/2-page max.): State the objectives of the proposed plan and an overview and statement of project goals for the proposed project
  3. Background and Significance (1/2-page max.): Describe the importance of the proposed topic or team of collaborators in relation to the priority areas.
  4. Methods or Strategy for Creating Collaboration (2 pages max.): Describe methods and activities that will be used to complete the collaborative effort or capacity building project.
  5. Potential for future network collaborations/projects (1/2 page max.): Describe how the proposed project or collaborative effort will lead to future network collaborations, projects, scholarly output, or engagement activities.
  6. Outcomes of the capacity building project or initiative: How will the project be assessed? Who will benefit from the project? Will the community be involved? What are the potential impacts?
  7. Timeline (1 page max.): Describe the project timeline. Please indicate key deliverables.
  8. Budget and Budget Justification: Please include a detailed budget and a justification for each line item. Funding may not be used for faculty salaries.
  9. A description of each partner and the role each will play in the proposed project. Alternatively, an investigator who has not identified a specific network partner can describe the role such a partner would need to play.
  10. A brief bio-sketch (3 pages maximum) for key personnel should be included.

Review Process and Criteria

Proposals will be reviewed by the Global Health Network, Pilot Funding Steering committee. For institutional members who would like to submit a proposal and have not identified partners, please email network coordinator Margaret Winchester (winchester@psu.edu), in advance of the proposal deadline for assistance in building teams.

Awards

All proposals will receive feedback and, if not funded initially, suggestions will be offered to improve chances of funding in the future. Proposals that leverage the network and have concrete objectives and deliverables will be prioritized. Proposals must focus on initiatives that would not be possible without the involvement of the network. Innovation and potential for sustainable collaborative relationships and future work among partners will also be evaluated. The number of awarded proposals will depend on the quality, alignment with PUNGH’s strategic objectives, and funding. Funded projects must be completed within 12 months. Each application will be reviewed by at least 3 partners, including 1 partner from a university not involved with the application.

Deliverables

Awardees are expected to 1) deliver an update and overview of the funded project at the next network meeting and 2) produce midterm and final reports on outcomes with key deliverables attached (e.g. agenda from meeting, manuscript, grant proposal).

Cape Town Global Health Network, 3rd Meeting, Final Report

PAN UNIVERSITY NETWORK FOR GLOBAL HEALTH (PUNGH)

THIRD MEETING REPORT   (PDF Version)

UNIVERSITY OF CAPE TOWN
CAPE TOWN, SOUTH AFRICA
12-13 OCTOBER 2015

Delegates from five universities and government representatives at the 3rd meeting of the Pan University Network for Global Health

SUMMARY

The two day network meeting hosted by the University of Cape Town included presentations of the first round of pilot funded projects, engagement with local government representatives, and in depth discussion of network activities and structure.

Network members agreed to consolidate future membership to prepare for the possibility of adding other universities in the future and develop a more equitable decision-making process. The six champions of the actively involved institutions (founding partners) will meet quarterly and act as a steering committee for future network activities. The next round of pilot funding will consolidate projects around the network’s two central themes (1. Urbanization and health and 2. Multimorbidities) and include funding to begin an engagement/ education project.

The next network meeting will be held in Pune, India in 2016.

ATTENDEES

University of Cape Town

  • Olufunke Alaba
  • Anna Coussens
  • Mohamed Jeebhay
  • Mamadou Kaba
  • *Tolu Oni (organizer)

Pennsylvania State University

  • Michael Adewumi
  • Collins Airhihenbuwa
  • *Rhonda BeLue
  • Rob Crane
  • Reni Elewonibi
  • Alison Gernand
  • Brian King
  • Caprice Knapp
  • Dana Naughton
  • Margaret Winchester (network coordinator)

University of Freiburg

  • Sonia Diaz-Monsalve
  • PUNGH 3RD MEETING REPORT PAGE 3
  • Richard Gminski
  • Rebekka Mumm
  • Michael Wirsching
  • *Ursula Wittwer-Backofen

University of Limpopo

  • *Hans Onya
  • Linda Skaal

University of the West Indies

  • *Alafia Samuels

Savitribai Phule Pune University

  • *Deepti Deobagkar (unable to attend)

*Indicates Institutional Champion

DAY ONE, MONDAY 12 OCTOBER 2015

Highlights

  • Morning remarks and welcome
  • Special address from Dr. Beth Engelbrecht, Head: Western Cape Department of Health
  • Seed grant presentations
  • Display of posters from Cape Town- Freiburg project on urban health
  • Meeting with government stakeholders

Morning remarks

The meeting was started with welcoming remarks from Porf Tania Douglas, the Deputy Dean of Research for the Faculty of Health Sciences at UCT and Prof Mohamed Jeebhay, Head of the School of Public Health and Family Medicine at UCT.

Dr. Collins Airhihenbuwa informed the network that he will be leaving Penn State, as of 1 January 2016, for a position at Saint Louis University as Dean of the College for Public Health and Social Justice. Dr. Rhonda BeLue, who has been involved in the network since its inception will be replacing Collins as the interim director of the network beginning in January.

Special address from Dr. Beth Engelbrecht, Head: Western Cape Department of Health

Facilitated by the UCT organizers, Dr. Beth Engelbrecht gave a talk about the state of the health Department in the Western Cape. She emphasized their patient-centered approach and two priority areas: 1) the first 1000 days, from conception to age two and 2) management of chronic conditions. They are also actively engaging and training community health workers to integrate care.

Seed grant presentations

The six seed grants funded through the network in December 2014 shared their work to date and plans for the future to showcase current network activities.

  1. Strengthening Health Systems for Chronic Care: Intersection of Communicable and Non-communicable Diseases Services in SA – PSU (BeLue), UL (Onya) and UCT (Oni)
  2. Development of a multidisciplinary network of established and emerging scholars on migration, urbanisation and health in southern Africa. – PSU (Matthews), UCT (Oni & Adams)
  3. Obesity Paradox: Body Mass Index and Mortality in US and Asian Older Adults. – PSU (Gao), SPPU (Deobagkar, Sahni, Tambe, Nagarkar), Hebei Union University and Kailuan Hospital (Wu)
  4. Identifying Urban Transition Priority Areas for Mother and Child Interventions in Cape Town. – PSU (Knapp), UCT (Oni), UF (Wittwer-Backofen), SPPU (Deobagkar)
  5. The Impact of Urbanization on Vitamin D Deficiency and Adverse Pregnancy Outcomes.  – PSU (Gernand), SPPU (Deobagkar, Ashma, Jeyakumar), UCT (Coussens and Davids)
  6. Intersection of HIV/AIDS and CNCDs, focusing on Cardiovascular Diseases (CVDs): Creating Collaborative Teams – PSU (Francis), UWI (Samuels), UCT (Oni)

Questions and discussion following the seed grant presentations covered the following themes:

  • What are some of the issues with the language of conducting interdisciplinary/ multidisciplinary work?
  • What are the upstream and downstream effects that we are studying?
  • What is the difference between studying “patients” and “populations”?
  • How can we evaluate engagement in research projects?
  • What are some of the structural drivers of the issues being studied?
  • What are some strategies for using difficult-to-obtain data in research?

Government Stakeholder Meeting

In the afternoon, network members engaged in conversation with government representatives about their work, the needs of the Western Cape region, and points of intersection between policy, practice, and research. In particular, the recently released Strategic Plan presents many opportunities for translating research to practice in the region (https://www.westerncape.gov.za/documents/plans/2015 ).

SA stakeholders

Western Cape Department of Health

Beth Engelbrecht; Head of Department

Anthony Hawkridge; Director: Health Impact Assessment Directorate

Western Cape Department of Environmental Affairs and Development Planning:

Gottlieb Arendse; Chief Director: Environmental Quality

Joy Leaner; Director: Air Quality management

Western Cape Department of Transport and Public Works

Hector Elliott; Chief Director: Road Safety coordination

Western Cape Department of the Premier

Tristan J Görgens; Policy and Strategy Analyst: Policy and Strategy Unit

Western Cape Department of Human Settlements

Tracy Jooste, Director: Policy and Research

Cape Winelands District Municipality

Gabriël de Klerk; Environmental Health Practitioner

DAY TWO, TUESDAY 13 OCTOBER 2015

Highlights:

  • Discussion of network-related and network-sponsored activities
  • Recommendations for a new steering committee and model for membership
  • Development of guidelines for second round of pilot funding

Objectives:

  1. Come together to create cross-national knowledge and innovation transfer between and within global North and South universities.
  2. Conduct capacity building, research and training activities around methodological, conceptual research activities based on network research themes.
  3. Develop a pipeline of early career, postgraduate and student researches trained to conduct interdisciplinary research characterized by cross-national knowledge and innovation transfer.
  4. Generate practice-based evidence and advocacy through stakeholder engagement

Rules of Engagement:

All network activities should be collaborative from inception and through all stages.

Definition of a Network Project:

  1. A project that resulted from network funding or
  2. Projects that were submitted to the Champions for approval, and other partners were invited to collaborate and move the project forward
  3. Network enabled projects are projects such as student theses or other papers/grant work that occurred due to proximity of network members or something that flows out of network projects.
  4. Network enables projects should be document as they were made possible because of the Network. They can become an official network project by following 1) above. Champions will discuss the details of the process at the next call.

Membership:

Membership-resources and Process Recommendations:

  1. All 6 participating Universities will be referred to as foundational members. The language about “core” institutions will be left in the past with the first phase of seed grant funding.
  2. The 6 champions from each of the foundational institutions will serve on an Executive Committee that will advise the Director and Network Coordinator (and other appropriate personnel)
  3. New members will have to apply for consideration. The Executive Committee and leadership will evaluate these applications on behalf of the entire network
  4. Potential new members have to meet criteria that span the research, teaching, and administrative areas (these are spelled out in more detail below)
  5. The Executive Committee and Network leadership is charged with ensuring there is a diversity of membership from geographic regions, type of institution, discipline represented…etc.
  6. The Executive Committee will play in role in setting the agenda for future international meetings.

In terms of the application process, the following were suggested as criteria that could be included:

  • The application should come from a person self-identified as the champion for the considered institution. Successful applications will have a team of interested people from that institution. It is not expected that they will have worked together previously, as the network might serve as a mechanism for new collaborations
  • Successful applications will come from a team with diversity in their disciplinary orientation
  • There should be a letter of support from the institution, ideally from a high-ranking administrator
  • The champion and other members should attend the meetings whenever possible
  • The application should have a statement that there will be an attempt to secure funding from the considered institution at some point. This could be used to fund their travel to the meetings or support future seed grants. A commitment of funding is not required for consideration of membership in the network
  • The application should describe the strengths and weakness of the group as they relate to the two topical areas (urban health and NCD-CD)
  • The application should describe how the group will contribute to research, education, and capacity building, and benefit from participating in the network in these areas. This will show how participation with the network will advance the network’s mission and that of the participating institution.

It was recommended that by the next quarterly meeting the champions would reflect on their home institutions to ensure that the expectations for members, as expressed in the application, are met by the 6 foundational members.

Pilot Funding

The groups discussed that pilot funding should lead to external funding in order to facilitate network sustainability.

Penn State will contribute $50,000. This money will be divided among the two themes to focus on scaling up and combining currently funded projects, plus one additional open call for training and capacity-building proposals.

$20,000 for a project related to urbanization. Investigators from round 1 urbanization projects met to combine their projects into one. Discussions will continue in preparation for the call for pilot 2 proposals.

$20,000 for a project related to multimorbidity. Investigators from round 1 multi-morbidity project met to combine their projects into one. Discussions will continue in preparation for the call for pilot 2 proposals.

$10,000 for a project related to training/education and outreach. An open call with ideas related to this topic will be released in November.

The call for pilot funding will request 1) Scientific objectives/content 2) Potential external funding opportunities 3) Resources that each investigators respective university will contribute to the pilot funding activities

Reni Elewonibi (PSU): melewonibi@gmail.com has volunteered to help search for funding opportunities.

Website

Meg has been working on an interactive website where all members can create research profiles, share data, and update the group with their information. Penn State has agreed to fund the first two years of the site and then the network will need to find a sustaining source.

FUTURE PLANS AND WAY FORWARD

Meetings:

  • Quarterly meetings will be held with the six champions via Skype
  • The next annual meeting will be held in Pune in 2016. UWI has offered to host the 2017 meeting in Barbados
  • Quarterly email updates will be sent out via email newsletter format. Requests for contributions will be requested on a quarterly basis. Conferences, manuscripts or funding opportunities of interest or project updates can be included in the email.
  • Champions will discuss issues of network-sponsored and network-related activities, as well as guidelines for engagement among members
  • Future meetings will consider potentially using a three-day format and continue to engage local stakeholders

Evaluation:

  • The network has to document outputs and outcomes so that we can provide evidence that the financial contributions are with the investment
  • Rhonda will send out a logic model that can guide ongoing evaluation and reporting for input from all network members
  • We will evaluate collaborative processes as a team in an ongoing basis to ensure inclusion among the member universities

Seed grant funding

  • The call for proposals will be sent out by the end of 2015, after discussion among the six institutional champions

Other

  • Members indicated that they are open to changing the name of the network. Ideas are welcome
  • If all universities are on board, we will proceed with signing of the network MOU to facilitate future funding applications

 

Cape Town Global Health Network, 3rd Meeting, Final Report

PAN UNIVERSITY NETWORK FOR GLOBAL HEALTH (PUNGH)

THIRD MEETING REPORT   (PDF Version)

UNIVERSITY OF CAPE TOWN
CAPE TOWN, SOUTH AFRICA
12-13 OCTOBER 2015

Delegates from five universities and government representatives at the 3rd meeting of the Pan University Network for Global Health

SUMMARY

The two day network meeting hosted by the University of Cape Town included presentations of the first round of pilot funded projects, engagement with local government representatives, and in depth discussion of network activities and structure.

Network members agreed to consolidate future membership to prepare for the possibility of adding other universities in the future and develop a more equitable decision-making process. The six champions of the actively involved institutions (founding partners) will meet quarterly and act as a steering committee for future network activities. The next round of pilot funding will consolidate projects around the network’s two central themes (1. Urbanization and health and 2. Multimorbidities) and include funding to begin an engagement/ education project.

The next network meeting will be held in Pune, India in 2016.

ATTENDEES

University of Cape Town

  • Olufunke Alaba
  • Anna Coussens
  • Mohamed Jeebhay
  • Mamadou Kaba
  • *Tolu Oni (organizer)

Pennsylvania State University

  • Michael Adewumi
  • Collins Airhihenbuwa
  • *Rhonda BeLue
  • Rob Crane
  • Reni Elewonibi
  • Alison Gernand
  • Brian King
  • Caprice Knapp
  • Dana Naughton
  • Margaret Winchester (network coordinator)

University of Freiburg

  • Sonia Diaz-Monsalve
  • PUNGH 3RD MEETING REPORT PAGE 3
  • Richard Gminski
  • Rebekka Mumm
  • Michael Wirsching
  • *Ursula Wittwer-Backofen

University of Limpopo

  • *Hans Onya
  • Linda Skaal

University of the West Indies

  • *Alafia Samuels

Savitribai Phule Pune University

  • *Deepti Deobagkar (unable to attend)

*Indicates Institutional Champion

DAY ONE, MONDAY 12 OCTOBER 2015

Highlights

  • Morning remarks and welcome
  • Special address from Dr. Beth Engelbrecht, Head: Western Cape Department of Health
  • Seed grant presentations
  • Display of posters from Cape Town- Freiburg project on urban health
  • Meeting with government stakeholders

Morning remarks

The meeting was started with welcoming remarks from Porf Tania Douglas, the Deputy Dean of Research for the Faculty of Health Sciences at UCT and Prof Mohamed Jeebhay, Head of the School of Public Health and Family Medicine at UCT.

Dr. Collins Airhihenbuwa informed the network that he will be leaving Penn State, as of 1 January 2016, for a position at Saint Louis University as Dean of the College for Public Health and Social Justice. Dr. Rhonda BeLue, who has been involved in the network since its inception will be replacing Collins as the interim director of the network beginning in January.

Special address from Dr. Beth Engelbrecht, Head: Western Cape Department of Health

Facilitated by the UCT organizers, Dr. Beth Engelbrecht gave a talk about the state of the health Department in the Western Cape. She emphasized their patient-centered approach and two priority areas: 1) the first 1000 days, from conception to age two and 2) management of chronic conditions. They are also actively engaging and training community health workers to integrate care.

Seed grant presentations

The six seed grants funded through the network in December 2014 shared their work to date and plans for the future to showcase current network activities.

  1. Strengthening Health Systems for Chronic Care: Intersection of Communicable and Non-communicable Diseases Services in SA – PSU (BeLue), UL (Onya) and UCT (Oni)
  2. Development of a multidisciplinary network of established and emerging scholars on migration, urbanisation and health in southern Africa. – PSU (Matthews), UCT (Oni & Adams)
  3. Obesity Paradox: Body Mass Index and Mortality in US and Asian Older Adults. – PSU (Gao), SPPU (Deobagkar, Sahni, Tambe, Nagarkar), Hebei Union University and Kailuan Hospital (Wu)
  4. Identifying Urban Transition Priority Areas for Mother and Child Interventions in Cape Town. – PSU (Knapp), UCT (Oni), UF (Wittwer-Backofen), SPPU (Deobagkar)
  5. The Impact of Urbanization on Vitamin D Deficiency and Adverse Pregnancy Outcomes.  – PSU (Gernand), SPPU (Deobagkar, Ashma, Jeyakumar), UCT (Coussens and Davids)
  6. Intersection of HIV/AIDS and CNCDs, focusing on Cardiovascular Diseases (CVDs): Creating Collaborative Teams – PSU (Francis), UWI (Samuels), UCT (Oni)

Questions and discussion following the seed grant presentations covered the following themes:

  • What are some of the issues with the language of conducting interdisciplinary/ multidisciplinary work?
  • What are the upstream and downstream effects that we are studying?
  • What is the difference between studying “patients” and “populations”?
  • How can we evaluate engagement in research projects?
  • What are some of the structural drivers of the issues being studied?
  • What are some strategies for using difficult-to-obtain data in research?

Government Stakeholder Meeting

In the afternoon, network members engaged in conversation with government representatives about their work, the needs of the Western Cape region, and points of intersection between policy, practice, and research. In particular, the recently released Strategic Plan presents many opportunities for translating research to practice in the region (https://www.westerncape.gov.za/documents/plans/2015 ).

SA stakeholders

Western Cape Department of Health

Beth Engelbrecht; Head of Department

Anthony Hawkridge; Director: Health Impact Assessment Directorate

Western Cape Department of Environmental Affairs and Development Planning:

Gottlieb Arendse; Chief Director: Environmental Quality

Joy Leaner; Director: Air Quality management

Western Cape Department of Transport and Public Works

Hector Elliott; Chief Director: Road Safety coordination

Western Cape Department of the Premier

Tristan J Görgens; Policy and Strategy Analyst: Policy and Strategy Unit

Western Cape Department of Human Settlements

Tracy Jooste, Director: Policy and Research

Cape Winelands District Municipality

Gabriël de Klerk; Environmental Health Practitioner

DAY TWO, TUESDAY 13 OCTOBER 2015

Highlights:

  • Discussion of network-related and network-sponsored activities
  • Recommendations for a new steering committee and model for membership
  • Development of guidelines for second round of pilot funding

Objectives:

  1. Come together to create cross-national knowledge and innovation transfer between and within global North and South universities.
  2. Conduct capacity building, research and training activities around methodological, conceptual research activities based on network research themes.
  3. Develop a pipeline of early career, postgraduate and student researches trained to conduct interdisciplinary research characterized by cross-national knowledge and innovation transfer.
  4. Generate practice-based evidence and advocacy through stakeholder engagement

Rules of Engagement:

All network activities should be collaborative from inception and through all stages.

Definition of a Network Project:

  1. A project that resulted from network funding or
  2. Projects that were submitted to the Champions for approval, and other partners were invited to collaborate and move the project forward
  3. Network enabled projects are projects such as student theses or other papers/grant work that occurred due to proximity of network members or something that flows out of network projects.
  4. Network enables projects should be document as they were made possible because of the Network. They can become an official network project by following 1) above. Champions will discuss the details of the process at the next call.

Membership:

Membership-resources and Process Recommendations:

  1. All 6 participating Universities will be referred to as foundational members. The language about “core” institutions will be left in the past with the first phase of seed grant funding.
  2. The 6 champions from each of the foundational institutions will serve on an Executive Committee that will advise the Director and Network Coordinator (and other appropriate personnel)
  3. New members will have to apply for consideration. The Executive Committee and leadership will evaluate these applications on behalf of the entire network
  4. Potential new members have to meet criteria that span the research, teaching, and administrative areas (these are spelled out in more detail below)
  5. The Executive Committee and Network leadership is charged with ensuring there is a diversity of membership from geographic regions, type of institution, discipline represented…etc.
  6. The Executive Committee will play in role in setting the agenda for future international meetings.

In terms of the application process, the following were suggested as criteria that could be included:

  • The application should come from a person self-identified as the champion for the considered institution. Successful applications will have a team of interested people from that institution. It is not expected that they will have worked together previously, as the network might serve as a mechanism for new collaborations
  • Successful applications will come from a team with diversity in their disciplinary orientation
  • There should be a letter of support from the institution, ideally from a high-ranking administrator
  • The champion and other members should attend the meetings whenever possible
  • The application should have a statement that there will be an attempt to secure funding from the considered institution at some point. This could be used to fund their travel to the meetings or support future seed grants. A commitment of funding is not required for consideration of membership in the network
  • The application should describe the strengths and weakness of the group as they relate to the two topical areas (urban health and NCD-CD)
  • The application should describe how the group will contribute to research, education, and capacity building, and benefit from participating in the network in these areas. This will show how participation with the network will advance the network’s mission and that of the participating institution.

It was recommended that by the next quarterly meeting the champions would reflect on their home institutions to ensure that the expectations for members, as expressed in the application, are met by the 6 foundational members.

Pilot Funding

The groups discussed that pilot funding should lead to external funding in order to facilitate network sustainability.

Penn State will contribute $50,000. This money will be divided among the two themes to focus on scaling up and combining currently funded projects, plus one additional open call for training and capacity-building proposals.

$20,000 for a project related to urbanization. Investigators from round 1 urbanization projects met to combine their projects into one. Discussions will continue in preparation for the call for pilot 2 proposals.

$20,000 for a project related to multimorbidity. Investigators from round 1 multi-morbidity project met to combine their projects into one. Discussions will continue in preparation for the call for pilot 2 proposals.

$10,000 for a project related to training/education and outreach. An open call with ideas related to this topic will be released in November.

The call for pilot funding will request 1) Scientific objectives/content 2) Potential external funding opportunities 3) Resources that each investigators respective university will contribute to the pilot funding activities

Reni Elewonibi (PSU): melewonibi@gmail.com has volunteered to help search for funding opportunities.

Website

Meg has been working on an interactive website where all members can create research profiles, share data, and update the group with their information. Penn State has agreed to fund the first two years of the site and then the network will need to find a sustaining source.

FUTURE PLANS AND WAY FORWARD

Meetings:

  • Quarterly meetings will be held with the six champions via Skype
  • The next annual meeting will be held in Pune in 2016. UWI has offered to host the 2017 meeting in Barbados
  • Quarterly email updates will be sent out via email newsletter format. Requests for contributions will be requested on a quarterly basis. Conferences, manuscripts or funding opportunities of interest or project updates can be included in the email.
  • Champions will discuss issues of network-sponsored and network-related activities, as well as guidelines for engagement among members
  • Future meetings will consider potentially using a three-day format and continue to engage local stakeholders

Evaluation:

  • The network has to document outputs and outcomes so that we can provide evidence that the financial contributions are with the investment
  • Rhonda will send out a logic model that can guide ongoing evaluation and reporting for input from all network members
  • We will evaluate collaborative processes as a team in an ongoing basis to ensure inclusion among the member universities

Seed grant funding

  • The call for proposals will be sent out by the end of 2015, after discussion among the six institutional champions

Other

  • Members indicated that they are open to changing the name of the network. Ideas are welcome
  • If all universities are on board, we will proceed with signing of the network MOU to facilitate future funding applications