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Many paediatricians have had the good fortune to spend some of their careers in the developing world. My own overseas experiences have convinced me that the most important contribution to health that can be made by expatriate workers is not by cure, but through education.
Doctors have been criticised over the years for withholding their knowledge and skills from others, perhaps to maintain their own status and earning potential.1 However, as the global population increases and the state of the world’s poor deteriorates, this must change urgently. There are currently estimated to be 800 million people globally who have no significant access to health care facilities.2 Poor health and poor education are significant blocks to development in many parts of the world.
Through this paper I hope to encourage all paediatricians to teach for the benefit of the developing world. Such teaching can take place at home or abroad and can be undertaken by health professionals at all levels of training. In particular, I hope that it will highlight some of the advantages to paediatricians in training of spending some time working and sharing health knowledge in the developing world.
To teach or to learn?
The emphasis of this paper is on teaching. The teacher is, however, nothing more than a facilitator of the learning process. It is easy to forget that teaching that does not result in learning is useless. Teachers must always remember this simple, but important, fact.
Who should we teach?
Doctors have only a limited impact on the health of populations, especially in the developing world. In the case of children it is parents whose decisions and actions have the most impact on their health. In developing countries, if a parent decides a health “professional” is to be consulted, then it is more than likely to be somebody far more accessible than a …