Ghana Michigan platform to IMprove access, quality care, and training for health (IMPACT) - Vono east pilot project

This project pilots a coordinated platform to connect Ghana's health research institutions and tie their work more directly to improving care. Research in Ghana spans health services divisions, universities, professional colleges and hospitals, but is often loosely coordinated and only weakly linked to service delivery. Decades of University of Michigan and Ghana collaborations, beginning in obstetrics and gynecology and growing across emergency medicine, maternal and newborn health, surgery and pathology, have been fruitful but similarly fragmented. In the Bono East region, the team co-leads assessments of research capacity, data for decision-making, clinical education and training, and community health needs, engaging leaders across Ghanaian institutions. The pilot aligns with the World Health Organization's Networks of Practice model and lays the groundwork for a larger demonstration platform that fosters interdisciplinary, evidence-driven improvements in health.