A DEVELOPING-COUNTRY UNIVERSITY ORIENTED TOWARD STRENGTHENING HEALTH SYSTEMS - CHALLENGES AND RESULTS

Objectives. The Aga Khan University in Karachi has a mission to educat e leaders and to contribute to the development of health systems for P akistan amid challenges of scarcity and complexity. Methods. Its key a ctivities are (1) to design and test urban and rural health system pro totypes, (2) to develop faculty in medical and nursing postgraduate co mmunity health sciences programs, and (3) to design and implement comm unity-based undergraduate medical and nursing curricula. Results. The university has developed equity-based, cost-effective primary health c are prototypes in Karachi slums. With government counterparts it has t ested village-, facility-, and district-level interventions in a poor rural district. Federal policymakers have taken models from each for w idespread replication. The university is training 49 medical and 19 nu rsing faculty for postgraduate programs in community health sciences. Most faculty retain institutional leadership positions, including teac hing community-based, problem-solving, community health sciences as 20 % of the medical and nursing undergraduate curriculum. Conclusions: Th e mission and experience of the Aga Khan University in population-base d health systems design and health sciences education can guide univer sities in both developing and developed countries.