Botswana Rotations
Botswana Elective for Residents and Fellows:
This is a 4-week (or longer) elective in Botswana under the supervision of BIDMC faculty anesthesiologist, Dr. Catronia Stewart, the Program Director for the International Anesthesia and Critical Care resident and fellow rotations in Botswana. She has an adjunct faculty position at the University of Botswana and practices clinically at Princess Maria Hospital (PMH) and Sir Ketumile Masire Teaching Hospital (SKMT) in Gaborone. International trainees participating in this rotation will learn, practice and teach at one of these medical centers, depending on their interest and caseloads.
Senior residents in their CA-3/PGY-4 year and anesthesia fellows are welcome to apply to this elective rotation in Gaborone. Specialties offered at PMH are emergency medicine, pediatric, orthopedic, urological, vascular, ENT, dental, plastics, general, obstetric and gynecological surgeries. PMH is the government tertiary referral hospital. Elective surgeries are currently carried out at SKMTH, while emergency, obstetric and gynecological surgery happens at PMH.
The department consists of consultants (attendings), first and second year anesthesia trainees, medical officers, and anesthetic nurses split across the two sites. The operating theatres are very busy – in 2024 over 400 operations were performed using only 3-6 total operating sites.
The experience of practicing medicine in a resource-challenged country is invaluable and often life-changing. Residents and fellows use their skills as educators and clinicians to bolster the field of anesthesia and critical care in Botswana and experience bi-directional learning with the clinicians who practice there. It is a dynamic and challenging experience. They learn about perioperative patient care, general anesthesia and sedation in a setting quite different from their usual workplaces, caring for patients with advance pathology of diseases not often seen in their home training institutions. Resource limitations include not only medications but can encompass all aspects of the supply chain from electricity to staffing. Emphasis is placed on teaching, developing clinical skills, and thorough utilization of sometimes scarce resources
This experience allows participants to end their training with the full realization of the knowledge and capabilities they have developed over many years. Rotators gain confidence in their teaching skills and decision-making abilities in an environment where clinical assessment, flexibility, communication and teamwork are critical to success.
Check out reports from Botswana from our residents:
How to Apply:
Interested residents and fellows should send their CV and a letter of interest to Dr. Catronia Stewart at cstewar8@bidmc.harvard.edu.
Learning Objectives:
- Develop an understanding of the role of anesthesia, critical care and surgery in global and public health.
- Appreciate the burden of surgical disease in a middle-income country, including the absence of essential infrastructure for the provision of safe anesthesia.
- Refine clinical skills required for providing anesthesia and critical care in austere and remote settings where technology and other resources are limited.
- Provide compassionate, ethical, appropriate and effective patient care for low and middle-income countries.
- Make a lasting contribution to anesthesia care and knowledge in one of three ways: Undertake a QI project to help remedy any one of the myriad barriers to care experience by patients in Botswana; contribute to the international literature through a mentored research project pertaining to the global burden of surgical disease and/or the global anesthesia crisis; or to expand knowledge of established and evolving biomedical, clinical, epidemiological and social-behavioral sciences as well as the application of this knowledge to the safe practice of anesthesia in austere and remote settings.