News

Congratulations are in order for second year PhD in Health candidate Justine Dol. She has received a grant from the Nowegian-based Laerdal Foundation to her dissertation research. The amount of the award is $30,000 USD for one year.

Justine and her supervisor, Dr. Marsha Campbell-Yeo, received this grant as a co-principal investigators along with other members of Justine’s PhD committee. This includes Dr. Gail Tomblin Murphy (co-supervisor), Dr. Megan Aston and Dr. Doug McMillan from Dalhousie University. Also co-applicant on this is grant is Dr. Thecla Kohi from Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Science (MUHAS) in Tanzania.

This award will support Justine’s doctoral research, titled “Essential Coaching for Every Mother: Evaluating a modified education training program for mothers of newborns in Tanzania.” For Justine’s doctoral research, this grant will help support the development and evaluation the impact of a novel, standardized educational tool called Essential Coaching for Every Mother.

Improving maternal and newborn health

Essential Coaching for Every Mother will be a mother-friendly educational tool developed by the research team, building on the best evidence for essential newborn care and utilizing input directly from mothers.  The project focuses on helping mothers optimize their newborn’s outcomes while empowering them to ensure the best care possible for their newborns to survive and thrive. This project will be evaluated in Tanzania as a randomized control trial comparing the impact of Essential Coaching for Every Mother to an existing tool.  

This work builds on previous collaborations between Dalhousie University and MUHAS. Justine’s spent last summer in Tanzania as Queen Elizabeth Diamond Jubilee Scholar through the Dalhousie Global Health Office where she worked with Dr. Kohi on several ongoing research projects. Justine was also able to conduct preliminary research with mothers and nurse midwives in Tanzania that will help inform the currently funded project.

The Laerdal Foundation for Acute Medicine was established in 1980 to provide financial support to practically oriented research and development in acute medicine with a recent focus on projects relating to saving lives at birth in low-resource settings.