PaedSurg Africa is a multi-centre research collaboration of surgeons, anaesthetists and allied health professionals undertaking neonatal and paediatric surgery throughout sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Collectively, the collaboration has produced the largest prospective cohort study of paediatric surgery in this region of the world. The protocol may be found here. The full study manuscript has been published in BMJ Global Health and is available for download here.
The primary aim was to compare the outcomes of five common neonatal and paediatric surgical conditions between SSA and high-income countries.
Data was collected between October 2016 to April 2017 on five conditions (gastroschisis, anorectal malformation, appendicitis, inguinal hernia and intussusception). This involved 220 collaborators from 76 hospitals in 23 countries collecting data on 1407 children.
It has since been presented (and will continue to be presented) at numerous conferences across the world.
For a collaborator perspective of PaedSurg Africa, visit our blog to read about the experiences of Dr. Nurudeen Abdulraheem (Nigeria) and Dr. Theophilus Teddy (Ghana).