LIBERIA: Dr. Dougbeh Chris Nyan back for 2024 Volunteer-Service in Medicine, Public Health, and Academia

The globally renowned Liberian infectious disease doctor and scientist, Dr. Dougbeh Christopher Nyan, has arrived in Liberia from East Africa for another round of volunteer-services in clinical medicine and public health, and to lecture at selected universities for a semester beginning January next year, 2024.

Annually since 2005, Dr. Nyan, the German-trained medical doctor, has volunteered his services in contributing to training healthcare professionals in medicine, nursing, laboratory science, and public health.

For the next several months this semester, Dr. Nyan, the NIH-trained biomedical scientist, will be providing unpaid volunteer services at a number of academic institutions and medical facilities including the College of Health Sciences and Public Health department of the African Methodist University which have requested his services to lecture courses in infectious diseases, the SOS Medical Center, the St. Joseph Catholic Hospital, and possibly the John F. Kennedy Memorial Hospital.

In the last two years from August 2022 through July 2023, Dr. Nyan performed roughly 9 months of training workshops and lectures at healthcare and academic institutions including, the Monrovia College, Harbel College, and the Colleges of Health Sciences at the African Methodist University and the United Methodist University in Nimba County, and the Harbel Firestone Hospital, among others.

Liberia, a country founded around 1822 has several gaps in its healthcare delivery system, and was further weakened by the 2014 Ebola epidemic and the COVID-19 pandemic. The country has since faced a dauting task in reviving its healthcare system.

During the 2014 Ebola outbreak, Dr. Nyan testified before the US Congress and advocated for the creation of the African Center for Disease Control and the National Public Health Institutes in Liberia and other affected countries. He also contributed to the global and national response to the COVID-19 pandemic in the US and Liberia.

“Healthcare is paramount to human development and societal advancement; we must do all we can to strengthen our health system so that our people can have access to quality and affordable care,” Dr. Nyan added.

Dr. Nyan is the world renowned inventor of the Rapid Multiplex Real-Time Pathogen Diagnostic Test (the NYAN TEST) which simultaneously detects and identifies 3 to 7 infections using just one test. Dr. Nyan has received three US Patents for his inventions.

“I planned to render services to additional hard-to-reach counties as well, but transportation difficulties and bad roads constitute a big problem,” he concluded.