Dear Centre Leaders,
Greetings from the INDEPTH Secretariat. We hope you have had a good week.

We have the following items for your attention:

1. INDEPTH funded PhD student completes course
- Grateful to INDEPTH

Raymond Akawire Aborigo (pictured) is a public health specialist and a research fellow at the Navrongo HDSS in Ghana. He received partial funding from the INDEPTH Network to complete his PhD in Global Public Health, Monash University, Malaysia. Raymond returned to his Centre in September 2014 and he is participating in research activities of the Navrongo Health Research Centre (NHRC).

Raymond served as the Institutional Review Board administrator of the NHRC-IRB and played a critical role in the Centre's community engagement initiatives in the Kassena-Nankana District. He has recently been given the additional role to coordinate capacity building and research training programs in the Centre.

For the past 14 years, Raymond has been involved in varied research endeavours in the broad areas of population and reproductive health, malaria and research ethics.  His current research focuses on monitoring and auditing maternal and neonatal morbidities and mortalities in resource-poor settings.

His PhD research aimed at contextualising maternal morbidities and mortalities through maternal health audits. The study tested a tool for monitoring severe maternal morbidities within the community with a huge potential to be replicated for severe child morbidities. Raymond has interest in verbal autopsy methodology and has published in the area.

He serves on the World Health Organisation working group for social autopsy research and is currently part of a USAID-funded research collaboration between the Navrongo Health Research Centre and the University of Michigan.

The research aims to use social autopsy, socio-cultural audits and Geographical Information Systems to understand the socio-cultural factors that contribute to maternal and neonatal mortality in four districts in Ghana. 

Beyond maternal and neonatal health research, Raymond is part of an initiative to collaborate with interested institutions and individuals to attract funding for research in the areas of research ethics, community health and non-communicable diseases especially those related to alcohol and drug use.

Raymond has published widely and has conducted several peer reviews for renowned journals including PLoS one, BMC Public Health, Social Science and Medicine and Global Health Action.

Below is a list of some of his publications:

1. Aborigo RA, Allotey P, Tindana P, Azongo D, Debpuur C. Cultural imperatives and the ethics of verbal autopsies in rural Ghana. Glob Health Action. 2013;6: 18570.
   
2. Aborigo RA, Allotey P, Reidpath DD. The traditional healer in obstetric care: A persistent wasted opportunity in maternal health. Social Science & Medicine. 2015;133: 59–66. doi:10.1016/j.socscimed.2015.03.046
   
3. Aborigo RA, Allotey P, Reidpath D (2013) Contextualizing Maternal Morbidity through Community Case Reviews. Journal of Women’s Health Care 02. Available: http://www.omicsgroup.org/journals/2167-0420/2167-0420-2-e112.digital/2167-0420-2-e112.html. Accessed 1 April 2013.
   
4. Aborigo R, Moyer C, Gupta M, Adongo P, John W, et al. (2014a) Obstetric danger signs and factors affecting health seeking  behaviour among the Kassena-Nankani of Northern Ghana: A qualitative study. African Journal of Reproductive health 18: 66.
   
5. Aborigo RA, Moyer CA, Rominski S, Adongo P, Williams J, et al. (2012) Infant nutrition in the first seven days of life in rural northern Ghana. BMC Pregnancy Childbirth 12. doi:10.1186/1471-2393-12-76.
   
6. Dalaba MA, Akweongo P, Aborigo RA, Ataguba J. (2012) To insure or not to insure: The influence of insurance status on health seeking behaviour in the Kassena-Nankana district of Ghana. Afr J Health Sci 21: 161–173.
   
7. Engmann C, Adongo P, Akawire Aborigo R, Gupta M, Logonia G, et al. (2013) Infant illness spanning the antenatal to early neonatal continuum in rural northern Ghana: local perceptions, beliefs and practices. J Perinatol. doi:10.1038/jp.2012.151.
   
8. Engmann C, Walega P, Aborigo RA, Adongo P, Moyer CA, et al. (2012) Stillbirths and early neonatal mortality in rural Northern Ghana. Tropical Medicine & International Health 17: 272–282. doi:10.1111/j.1365-3156.2011.02931.x.
   
9. Moyer CA, Adongo PB, Aborigo RA, Hodgson A, Engmann CM (2013) “They treat you like you are not a human being”: Maltreatment during labour and delivery in rural northern Ghana. Midwifery. doi:10.1016/j.midw.2013.05.006.
   
10. Moyer CA, Aborigo RA, Logonia G, Affah G, Rominski S, et al. (2012) Clean delivery practices in rural northern Ghana: A qualitative study of community and provider knowledge, attitudes, and beliefs systems. BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth 12. Available: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2393/12/50/abstract. Accessed 15 June 2012.
    
11. Moyer CA, Adongo PB, Aborigo RA, Hodgson A, Engmann CM, et al. (2013) “It’s up to the Woman’s People”: How Social Factors Influence Facility-Based Delivery in Rural Northern Ghana. Maternal and Child Health Journal. Available: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10995-013-1240-y. Accessed 23 February 2013.
    
12. Oduro AR, Aborigo RA,Amugsi D, Anto F, Anyorigiya T, et al. (2008) Understanding and retention of the informed consent process among parents in rural northern Ghana. BMC Medical Ethics 9. Available: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6939/9/12/abstract. Accessed 15 June 2012.
    
13. Tindana P, Bull S, Amenga-Etego L, Vries J de, Aborigo R, et al. (2012) Seeking consent to genetic and genomic research in a rural Ghanaian setting: A qualitative study of the MalariaGEN experience. BMC Medical Ethics 13. Available: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6939/13/15/abstract. Accessed 4 July 2012.
    
14. Tindana PO, Rozmovits L, Boulanger RF, Bandewar SVS, Aborigo RA, et al. (2011) Aligning community engagement with traditional authority structures in global health research: a case study from northern Ghana. Am J Public Health 101: 1857–1867. doi:10.2105/AJPH.2011.300203.
    
15. Welaga P, Moyer CA, Aborigo R, Adongo P, Williams J, et al. (2013) Why Are Babies Dying in the First Month after Birth? A 7-Year Study of Neonatal Mortality in Northern Ghana. PLoS ONE 8. Available: http://dx.plos.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0058924. Accessed 1 April 2013
    
16. Maxwell Ayindenaba Dalaba, Patricia Akweongo, Raymond Aborigo, Timothy Awine, Daniel Azongo, Prosper Asaana, Frank Atuguba, Abraham Oduro: Does the national health insurance scheme in Ghana reduce household cost of treating malaria in the Kassena-Nankana districts, Global Health Action, 2014, 7: 23848
    
17. Hill E, Hess R, Aborigo R, Adongo P, Hodgson A, et al. (2014) “I don’t know anything about their culture”: the disconnect between allopathic and traditional maternity care providers in rural northern Ghana. Afr J Reprod Health 18: 36–45.
    
18. Dalaba MA, Akweongo P, Aborigo RA, Saronga HP, Williams J, Aninanya GA, et al. Cost to households in treating maternal complications in northern Ghana: a cross sectional study. BMC Health Services Research. 2015;15: 34. doi:10.1186/s12913-014-0659-1
    
19. Gupta ML, Aborigo RA, Adongo PB, Rominski S, Hodgson A, Engmann CM, et al. Grandmothers as gatekeepers? The role of grandmothers in influencing health-seeking for mothers and newborns in rural northern Ghana. Global Public Health. 2015; 1–14. doi:10.1080/17441692.2014.1002413
    
20. Chatio S, Aborigo R, Adongo PB, Anyorigiya T, Akweongo P, Oduro A. Adherence and Uptake of Artemisinin-Based Combination Treatments for Uncomplicated Malaria: A Qualitative Study in Northern Ghana. Smith TA, editor. PLOS ONE. 2015;10: e0116856. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0116856
    E-mail: raymond.aborigo@navrongo-nhrc.org/rayborigo@yahoo.com
    Phone: +233 205908860

2. Abstract submission for INDEPTH Scientific Conference still open

The abstract submission for the INDEPTH Scientific Conference is still open and will end on 15th May, 2015. We encourage all interested scientists to visit the link (Abstract Submission). You can read more on the ISC at (ISC 2015).

The conference will be held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, from November 11 – 14, 2015. It is on the theme “Health and Demographic Research to Inform the Post-2015 Development Agenda”.

Thank you.

Have a restful weekend!

Becky Kwei