Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (Ireland - Malawi)

RCSI is a world-leading health sciences education and research university with undergraduate and postgraduate schools and faculties across the health sciences.

Founded in 1784 to set and support professional standards for surgical training and practice in Ireland, the university has seven schools offering undergraduate and postgraduate degrees and professional qualifications aligned to Ireland’s national framework of qualifications. RCSI is the highest ranked (Times Higher Education) university in the world in terms of contribution to good health and well-being, the third United Nations Sustainable Development Goal.

In 2023/2024, the Eurofins Foundation is supporting the project KidSURG Africa in Malawi, which aims to significantly reduce childhood mortality in southern Malawi by training a robust local paediatric workforce.

An estimated two million children are living with a condition that could be treated by either a surgical procedure or consultation. Access to surgical care is a major challenge, and only a fraction receive adequate care. Treatment options are limited because of critical shortages of paediatric equipment and resources and lack of adequate infrastructure to cater to the surgical needs of children.

KidSURG tackles the issue of lack of access to paediatric surgical care for rural Malawians by:

Addressing the shortfall in surgical equipment and medical expertise within rural hospitals;
Training healthcare workers to provide high-quality, pre-referral care for complex paediatric surgical patients, and deliver safe surgery locally for some of the most common procedures needed by children;
Establishing a clinical consultation network, through which paediatric surgeons in city hospitals can provide immediate advice on patient management to clinicians at rural hospitals.

Phase 2 (2023-2026) will train and supervise anaesthesia and nursing providers, enabling selected surgical cases to be undertaken at rural hospitals, where appropriate, and to expand the training, coverage and delivery of accessible paediatric surgery to more rural hospitals.

This project contributes to the following United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals

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