Gertrude’s Opens Training Hub for Heart Surgeons

Although the demand for heart surgeons trained in a year is twenty, Kenya produces only four to five annually. This results in a gap in diagnosis and treatment of heart illnesses. The East African Simulation Centre for Cardiovascular Surgery was recently established at Gertrude's Children's Hospital in Kenya through partnership with the University of Nairobi and the German Heart Institute in Berlin.

Through this collaboration, the University of Nairobi will provide the trainers while the German Heart Institute will donate the equipment to improve training for cardiovascular surgery students and professionals, serving as a hub for the East African region. The center is directed locally by Dr. Mark Awori, head of pediatric cardiac surgery and was made possible from efforts led by Professor Charles Yankah of the German Heart Institute and the Pan-African Society for Cardio-Thoracic Surgery.