NIHR Global Health Research Centres 1:Non-communicable disease control in West Africa Project description  	A UK and low-and-middle-income-country (LMIC) partnership that aims to contribute to improved health and wellbeing of populations in West Africa, through comprehensive and sustainable capacity strengthening for high-quality applied non-communicable disease (NCD) research in Burkina Faso, Ghana and Niger to inform improved prevention, screening, primary care diagnosis and management/referrals of interrelated hypertension, diabetes and common mental health problems. 

Between 2022 and 2027, our partnership between the Ghana College of Physicians and Surgeons, the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, Asheshi University, Laboratoire d'Etudes et    de Recherche sur les Dynamiques Sociales et le    Développement Local (LASDEL) and Université Catholique de l'Afrique de l'Ouest -  Unité Universitaire at Bobo-Dioulasso (UCAO-UUB), will use comprehensive and sustainable approaches to capacity strengthening, improving individual, organisational and system-level capacities of: (a) researchers, particularly earlier-career staff, for high-quality applied NCD research, (b) local communities, to engage with and improve behaviours and decisions affecting their health and (c) policymakers and practitioners, to implement evidence-based NCD interventions. This will help to address the urgent need for improving control of non-communicable diseases in West Africa, where healthcare has been traditionally neglected and driven by disease-specific programmes, with limited engagement of local communities. The NIHR Global Health Research Centres 1:Non-communicable disease control in West Africa’s  goal is to contribute to improved health of West African populations through comprehensive and sustainable capacity strengthening for high-quality applied NCD research to improve prevention, diagnosis and management of hypertension, diabetes and related common mental disorders (anxiety, stress, depression).


Specific objectives are to:

1. Deepen understanding of contextual influences and effective pathways to prevention, diagnosis and management of NCDs in West Africa; 

2. Co-produce with key stakeholders, contextually-adapted packages of interventions for prevention, diagnosis and management of NCDs at community and primary care levels; and conduct formative process evaluation; 

3. Implement the intervention package through existing health systems in each country, and evaluate its feasibility, acceptability, clinical effects, equitable reach and cost-effectiveness; 

4. Comprehensively and sustainably strengthen capacities of researchers, communities and decision-makers, for high-quality applied NCD research and its uptake;

5. Ensure effective research communication and uptake into policies and practices of patients, communities, service providers, and national/West African decision-makers; 

6. Continuously engage with key stakeholders at community, sub-national, national levels within each country and within West Africa; 

7. Establish and maintain equitable partnerships between the West African and UK applicants, through shared leadership and governance arrangements.