DEVELOPING COUNTRIES

Dr Eric Bafende

Dr Eric Bafende was born in Belgium and, at the age of six, moved to Democratic Republic of Congo with his parents who were returning there. Dr Bafende is currently the Director of the Protestant Medical Institute (Institut Médical Evangélique (IME)) hospital in the Democratic Republic of Congo. He graduated from the Medical School of the University of Kinshasa in 1988 and subsequently obtained a Diploma in Internal Medicine at Tel-Aviv University in Israel where he also trained in Emergency Medicine, Intensive Care and Oncology. He trained in diabetes management in Kinshasa and has travelled widely on Medical visits particularly in the UK, Belgium, Sweden and Switzerland.

Dr Bafende has organised training sessions for Health workers in the Lower Congo, and made contributions to national and international conferences on various aspects of the management of AIDS, tuberculosis, diabetes and infectious diseases. Dr Bafende has a particular interest in Buruli ulcer and attended the 7th meeting of the special consultative group of WHO on Buruli ulcer in 2003 at the WHO headquarters in Geneva. He has recently published a survey of the epidemiology of Buruli ulcer in the Kimpese district of the Congo. He is joint author of a study on the potential role of freshwater snails, aquatic insects, fish, rodents, lizards and amphibians as reservoirs for Mycobacterium ulcerans which was presented at the 8th Maastricht Medical Students Research Conference 2004. Dr Bafende is fluent in French, English and Lingala, but also speaks Kikongo, Swahili and Topoke. He is interest ed in music including church music and jazz and also plays the piano.

Address:
IME/Kimpese Hospital,
Kimpese, Bas Congo,
Democratic Republic of Congo
E-mail: ericbafende@hotmail.com

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