Arthur Ajwang

I am Dr. Arthur Ajwang, a Kenyan by birth, resident of Kenya currently, still single, working as a Medical Doctor at the Kisumu Teaching and Referral Hospital as a General Practitioner, and also Tutorial Fellow of the Uzima University, School of Medicine. I am your usual, jovial and very approachable, next door dude, baseball cap, T-shirt, American Khaki trousers and sneakers, kind of Medical Doctor. I obtained my Bachelor in Medicine and Surgery at the Uzima University, School of Medicine located within Kisumu City, in Kenya. I was a Co-investigator/Clinician in a Genetics of severe malarial-anaemia study, done by the Harvard Medical School and Kenyatta University. I also worked as a Co-investigator in a Clinical Trial for a nutritional supplement for Sickle Cell Disease patients. I was also a Co-investigator in a Cancer of the Cervix study, trying to establish the factors for the increase of young HIV negative women coming with advanced Cancer of the Cervix in Western Kenya at the Jaramogi Oginga Odinga Teaching and Referral Hospital. Earlier on, I worked as a Clinical Coordinator for the Kenya Medical Research Institute/Centre for Disease Control and Prevention {U.S.A} – Global AIDS Programme, establishing HIV/AIDS Clinics in community peripheral health facilities for easy access to patients who need the services. I then worked with Mildmay International {U.K}, training trainers of trainers on HIV/AIDS interventions and treatments. I also worked with the Nyanza Reproductive Health Society, as a Clinical Coordinator and a trainer of trainers for the voluntary medical male circumcision programme, for the prevention of Sexually Transmitted Infections and HIV, including Human Papilloma Virus {HPV}, to avoid Cancer of the Cervix and Cancer of the Penis. I did work with the University of Minnesota Medical School’s Global Paediatric Programme on highland malaria epidemics study. Lately, I worked with the Pennsylvania State University School of Engineering’s’ Humanitarian Engineering and Social Entrepreneurship department, in the use of 3D-Printing technology to solve hospital equipment needs and medical school skills training needs. I have been exploring the use of the 3D-Printing technology in the production of cheap personalized prostheses for cancer patients who have had amputations or breast mastectomies.

I watched in disbelief and sorrow, while in Medical School, as all the Cancer patients I met, died within a few weeks of being diagnosed with advanced cancers and/or admitted into the wards or enrolled in the Oncology clinic. Some of these patients could have benefitted from radiotherapy and some radical surgeries to either cure or prolong their lives, but the Oncology clinic was just a room with no radiotherapy unit nor oncologists to serve the patients. Some patients who had non-advanced cancers and were referred to hospitals with facilities that could help give them remission, could not afford the fares nor the treatments, and had no accommodation in those cities where the hospitals were. Almost all of our patients did not have health insurance to help alleviate the astronomical hospital bills that cancer brings about, insurance is like a luxury payment in this poor set up. The patients who needed palliative care for comfort as they awaited the inevitable, could not afford the pain medications nor any other drugs that were prescribed, hence they died while in severe pain, with total loss of their dignity. This led me to develop a keen interest in doing my fair share to help change this sad narrative to be better, hence my involvement in cancer prevention advocacy, cancer research and search for innovative cheap solutions to management of the case.

My interests are in the fields of Innovative Medical and Surgical solutions, digitized/computer aided medicine, Epidemiology {registered in the MSc. Epidemiology at the Liverpool University School of Tropical Medicine}, Haemoto-Oncology, Clinical Genetics and Health Advocacy. My keenest interest is establishing a Cancer Research and Innovation Centre, in Western Kenya, for the Study of Cancers and production of innovative, novel, accessible, cheap and effective solutions for the prevention, management and treatment of cancers in our region and the world.