Eric Burdge, MD: Albany Medical Center, Family Medicine- PGY2

Uganda: January 2025

 My recent trip to the Engeye Health Clinic in the village of Degeya in rural Uganda provided me with an opportunity for learning and growth as a physician. Engeye Health Clinic delivers primary care, urgent care, antenatal care, and low-risk birthing by a team of Ugandan Health Officers and Midwives. My time there was spent educating the health officers on their requested topics for CME, as well as seeing patients and identifying ways to improve care in the clinic.

  During conference days where we taught about the most recent updates on the management of heart failure, umbilical cord care, fracture management, suturing, pelvic inflammatory disease, and hypertensive disorders in pregnancy. While there, the Ugandan clinicians taught me about conditions I do not see often in my practice in the United States, such as malaria, brucellosis, and tuberculosis. The experience challenged me to use my medical knowledge to decide how medical intervention can be best used to make patient’s lives longer and more comfortable in a resource limited setting.

  I was fortunate to be given insight into Ugandan culture and common challenges of daily life in a rural village that helped guide my medical decision making and counseling regarding healthy living. One of my favorite experiences was performing home visits for patients who were unable to travel to the clinic. During those visits, I was able to practice medicine with the full perspective of the patient’s home life, resources, and challenges. I was often asked to see multiple members of the family, enabling me to utilize the full scope of my training as a family physician.

  Overall, this introduction to global health enabled me to understand the opportunities available in sharing medical training, providing patient care, and the development of my own skills as a clinician. I hope this will be the first of many similar trips.