BackgroundLow-and middle-income countries (LMICs) are disproportionately affected by neurosurgical burden of disease. This health inequity causes constraints in decision-making. Neurosurgical ethics helps us to assess the moral acceptability and effectiveness of clinical decisions. We aimed to assess ethical neurosurgical care and its effect on patient satisfaction in Cameroon.MethodsTwo questionnaires hosted on Google Forms were administered among inpatients and staff at two Cameroonian neurosurgery centers. The questionnaires covered the factors influencing health outcomes and ethics. Data were collected from November 11, 2020, to March 11, 2021 and analyzed with SPSS v 26 to generate non-parametric tests with a threshold of significance at 0.05.ResultsSeventy patients and twenty healthcare providers responded to the survey. Most patients faced financial hardship (57.1%; 95% CI = 45.7–68.6%), and felt that this affected the care they received (P = 0.02). Patients noticed changes in the care plan and care delivery attributable to the neurosurgical units' lack of resources. According to the patients and caregivers, these changes happened 31.0–50.0% of the time (42.9%, 95% CI = 5.7–21.4%). The majority of patients were pleased with their involvement in the decision-making process (58.6%; 95% CI = 47.1–70.0%) and felt their autonomy was respected (87.1%; 95% CI = 78.6–94.3%).ConclusionMultiple challenges to neurosurgical ethical care were seen in our study. Multimodal interventions based on the four ethical principles discussed are necessary to improve ethical neurosurgical decision-making in this low resource setting.
Background
Africa bears >15% of the global burden of neurosurgical disease. Yet to date, Africa still has the lowest neurosurgical workforce density globally, and efforts to fill this gap by 2030 need to be multiplied. Although the past decade has seen an increase in neurosurgery residency programs in the continent, it is unclear how these residency programs are similar or viable. This study aims to highlight the current status of neurosurgical training in Africa as well as the differences within departments, countries or African regions.
Methods
A literature search using keywords related to ‘neurosurgery’, ‘training’, and ‘Africa’ and relevant names of African countries will be performed on PubMed and Google Scholar. If unavailable online, the authors will contact local neurosurgeons at identified training programmes for their curricula. The residency curricula collected will be analysed against a standardized and validated medical education curriculum viability tool.
Results
The primary aim will be the description of African neurosurgical curricula. In addition, the authors will perform a comparative analysis of the identified African neurosurgical curricula using a standardized and validated medical education curriculum viability tool.
Discussion
This study will be the first to evaluate the current landscape of neurosurgery training in Africa and will highlight pertinent themes that may be used to guide further research. The findings will inform health system strengthening efforts by local training programme directors, governments, policymakers and stakeholders.
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