UCSF Professor Mentoring Future African Cancer Leaders

Jeffrey Martin, MDEpidemiologist and Director of UCSF’s Training in Clinical Research (TICR) Program, Jeffrey Martin, MD has established an education and longitudinal mentorship model for students of low- and middle- income countries. This model is producing a cadre of scientists ready to answer their countries most pressing research questions.

Understanding how to prevent and treat disease in Africa is just one passion of Dr. Jeffrey Martin, a UCSF epidemiologist who researches HIV-related malignancies. As director of UCSF’s Training in Clinical Research (TICR) Program he is also emphatic about providing access to quality education and mentorship. In particular, he prioritizes training international scholars who typically can’t access the educational advantages found in the U.S. His first protégé was Dr. Aggrey Sameere. During Dr. Sameere’s clinical practice in Uganda, he craved the tools to test and evaluate the best treatments for his patients.   When Dr. Martin offered him the opportunity to pursue a UCSF Master’s in Clinical Research through an NIH grant, he and his wife packed-up and moved with their 2 children to San Francisco. Now back in Uganda, he is s a collaborator of Dr. Martin’s and has those tools he desired. His research is being used to improve patient survival in rural Africa. Currently, he is testing efficacy of point-of-care diagnostics for early diagnosis of Kaposi-sarcoma, a tumor caused by infection with human herpesvirus 8.  Dr. Sameere notes, “To solve the problems we have in Africa, we must have the best tools, tools that come from research training and mentorship at the highest international level