TABASAMU: A multidisciplinary collaboration on building up research capacity in oral health and HIV/AIDS - D71 TABASAMU PROJECT ABSTRACT
Oral diseases are the most prevalent chronic illnesses in the world, and vulnerable populations, like people with
HIV (PWH), are most impacted by its occurrence. Worldwide, they account for 17 million years lived with disability
(YLDs) and approximately 17,000 Disability-Adjusted Life Years (DALYs), becoming the most common non-
communicable diseases (NCDs). Despite successful antiretroviral therapy (ART), oral diseases remain more
prevalent in PWH than those without HIV. Our proposal entitled “TABASAMU: A multidisciplinary
collaboration on building up research capacity in oral health and HIV/AIDS” prepares the path for a future
interdisciplinary research training program in Kenya involving the University of Washington (UW, Seattle, USA),
the University of Nairobi (UoN), and the Kenyatta National Hospital (KNH) (Nairobi, Kenya). The Tabasamu
(smile in Swahili) application is built upon the successes of the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) long-term
funding in the region. Our objectives are to: 1) Finalize the leadership of our Tabasamu network. By building
upon the long history of collaboration among the UW, UoN, and KNH, we will solidify existing relationships with
current researchers and stakeholders and engage new ones so as to create an alliance for integrating oral health
within their current HIV research and policy structures. Because we believe training efforts ought to be
decentralized, we plan to conduct a stakeholder analysis in Nairobi, Mombasa and Kisumu, the cities with the
largest HIV prevalence in Kenya, in order to: a) facilitate consensus among our Kenyan collaborators on the
perceived needs and priorities that our future D43 grant on oral health will address, b) understand current Kenyan
HIV research training programs and identify opportunities for oral health collaboration that will strength our
training grant application, and c) design a network map with identified potential mentors with enough active
research agendas for study trainees’ projects. 2) Identify a pioneer generation of oral health researchers. By
engaging county governments and utilizing our Tabasamu network in Nairobi, Mombasa, and Kisumu we will
identify potential high caliber trainees for the future D43 program. Through focus groups/video conferences
among possible trainees, we will gather data on interest, feasibility, logistics, financial burden, and possible
challenges that future trainees might encounter at their home institutions while taking time off for educational
purposes. Because communication among the potential candidates will enhance our pool of researchers, we
propose to develop a functional social media group that will boost interaction and provide a platform for engaging
in NIH activities and opportunities for future fellows. 3) Organize, develop, and finalize our D43 grant
application. Through this planning grant, we will have the capability to reach out to stakeholders and key
investigators at their work sites, therefore identifying oral health champions who will play a pivotal role in defining
an organizational structure to support a future HIV research training program in oral health. Based on the data
we will collect, we will be qualified to finalize our research training approaches (short-, medium-, and long-term).
