Tanzanian Injury Research Program Graduates Its First Students 


Just three years ago, the idea of a Tanzanian-led training program on injury research seemed doomed by obstacles. With an important funding deadline looming, both Catherine Staton, M.D., and Blandina Mmbaga, M.D., were battling cases of COVID-19, and Mmbaga was grieving the recent loss of her mother.

But Staton, an associate professor at the Duke Global Health Institute, and Mmbaga,  a pediatrician at Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Centre (KCMC) in Tanzania, persisted, securing funding to launch the Trauma Research Capacity Building in Kilimanjaro, Tanzania (TRECK) program. Led by Mmbaga, the program mentors Tanzanian students in research projects focused on reducing the prevalence of injuries and injury-related disabilities in the East African country.  

In November, that persistence paid off, as Staton and Mmbaga celebrated the graduation of TRECK’s first cohort. Four trainees — medical doctors Alice Andongolile, Rosalia Njau, William Nkenguye and Edwin Shewiyo — earned master’s degrees through the program. Nkenguye and Shewiyo have joined Kilimanjaro Christian Medical University College as lecturers in the department of biostatistics and epidemiology.

“Having worked with them before they entered the program, you see the maturity and growth into research,” says Mmbaga, who directs the Kilimanjaro Clinical Research Institute. “We are building the scientists of the future.”

“The impact of this group is something I never imagined,” says Staton, who co-directs DGHI’s  Global Emergency Medicine Innovation and Implementation (GEMINI) Center..

TRECK is one of several training programs to grow from DGHI’s long-standing partnership with KCMC, which began in the 1990s. More than 85 trainee positions have been created through the partnership, focusing on areas such as infectious diseases, maternal health, mental health and cancer. While many of those programs have been overseen by Duke faculty, TRECK is among the first to be led by Tanzanian researchers, with Duke in a supporting role.

The progression from partnership to leadership marks an important evolution in the two institutions’ collaboration, says Staton, who has been studying trauma care and injury prevention in Tanzania for more than a decade.

“This is the way to push the envelope on equitable global health where high-income countries fill in the gaps, and this is the direction that it should go,” she says. “Dr. Mmbaga is more than a collaborator and co-principal investigator. She is a friend, a mentor and true partner.”

The rise in injury and injury-related deaths in Tanzania is a compound issue. The country’s urbanization outpaces road infrastructure and traffic regulation, and alcohol use is a factor in many accidents. Few medical centers in the country specialize in trauma care. KCMC, which serves a population of nearly 2 million people, only formally opened an emergency department in 2019

“It’s important to reduce the occurrence of injuries rather than just treating a patient who could die or have a disability,” Mmbaga notes. Eighty percent of trauma patients at KCMC are men who, in many African cultures, economically provide for their families. “When you support your family, it affects them if you become bedridden or disabled. The family suffers.”

Staton and Mmbaga helped create the first registry of trauma cases in Tanzania, a valuable source of data for the TRECK students’ research. Analyzing patient records, the students discovered elderly patients had worse outcomes in trauma cases. Njau and Shewiyo were part of a team that secured a grant from the National Institutes of Health to create trauma care guidelines for elderly patients, another first for KCMC.

TRECK’s first four graduates are committed to continuing injury-related research, Staton says. And there are more on the way: Five students are currently pursuing master’s degrees through the program, which is funded through 2026 by a grant from NIH’s Fogarty International Center, and two Ph.D. candidates are expected to graduate next year.

“It’s a huge first step to address the issue,” Staton says. “It speaks to how amazing these learners are. We’re so proud.”