Dr. Patricia Njuguna

Current Mentees

Dr. Mainga Hamaluba

Dr. Mainga Hamaluba

Early Career Postdoctoral Fellow

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I am a clinician trained in Paediatrics in Oxford, UK. During my clinical training, I worked at the Oxford Vaccine Group. The work contributing to my thesis looked at the population biology of Streptococcus pneumoniae in pre-school children in Oxfordshire and Kathmandu, Nepal. We also conducted a vaccine trial in infants which led to the introduction and informed the schedule of the 10-valent pneumococcal conjugate vaccine in Nepalese infants.

My current interests focus on identifying key indicators of poor early and late neonatal outcomes in Kenya, and testing novel and established interventions for improved neonatal survival and neurodevelopment.

Dr. Obonyo Nchafatso, MBChB

Dr. Obonyo Nchafatso, MBChB

PhD Student

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Obonyo attained his Medical Degree in 2009 from the University of Nairobi, before proceeding to Kijabe Mission Hospital for his internship programme in 2010. In 2011, Obonyo, joined the KEMRI – Wellcome Trust Research Programme in Kilifi as a Clinical Research and Training Fellow supervised by Professor Kathryn Maitland and Dr. Bernadette Brent. His main focus was on the study of heart function in severely malnourished children (CAPMAL study). In 2013 he was awarded the awarded the prestigious Global Health Research Fellowship at Imperial College London under the Wellcome Trust’s Institutional Strategic Support Fund for his work on management of shock in children (MAPS study). In 2014, he was a Research Medical Officer at KEMRI – Wellcome Trust in the study evaluating the efficacy of fluid resuscitation guidelines in severely malnourished children (AFRIM study). Since mid-2015, Obonyo has been based at the Critical Care Research Group in Brisbane, Australia as an Echocardiography Research Fellow which entails using high frequency sound waves (ultrasound) to scan the heart. His PhD, supervised by Professor Kathryn Maitland and Professor John Fraser, focusses on evaluating dysfunction of the heart during infection and the response to drip-fluid treatment.

Obonyo is interested in heart research because children with healthy hearts make the best footballers – they endure physical exercise and play with a ‘good heart’ (no yellow/red cards)! He has great interest in soccer.

Affiliated Institution:

KEMRI – Wellcome Trust, Kenya 

Patricia is Paediatrician based in Kilifi, Kenya. She graduated with a Masters in Medicine (Paediatrics and Child Health) (University of Nairobi) in 2006. She has worked in the area of neurology (Neurodiability in the community) under Prof Charles Newton from 2001-2003. Her Master’s thesis was an audit of management of coma in the national referral hospital. From 2006 she has been involved with the Clinical Trials Facility working in the area of malaria vaccines. This includes the GSK candidate vaccine – RTS,S. Her other interests include mechanisms that governments and other agencies use to determine the uptake of various vaccines in different parts of the world. She is a member of the Brighton collaboration, the Kenya Medical Association and the Kenya Paediatric Association. Patricia is author or co-author of 8 publications in malaria and neurology.