Helping Fight AIDS in Africa

Giving back to the global community.

Into Africa Ellen Gould Chadwick, MD, GME ’85, has gone for the past three years to share her expertise in the prevention of HIV and care of infected children and teens. Working with the International Center for AIDS Care and Treatment Programs (ICAP) based at Columbia University, this professor of pediatrics has traveled to Kenya, Ethiopia, and South Africa to train local health care providers at the front lines of Africa’s AIDS epidemic.

Dr. Chadwick has participated in ICAP’s prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV program and seen patients in HIV clinics where she does “on the ground teaching� with physicians. She explains, “We’ve helped bring them up to speed on new antiretroviral therapies, advanced diagnostic tools, and better methods of care.�

Rob Murphy also contributes to Kenya. Read more.

In August 2007 Dr. Chadwick revisited one of the largest HIV clinics in Kisumu, Kenya. Thrilled to see two years later that the facility had more resources and drugs to offer, she also noted that the clinic was serving many more patients with fewer physicians. “The programs in ICAP continue to be important,� says Dr. Chadwick, who plans to volunteer her services once a year as needed. “Progress is being made, but more still needs to be done.�