Medicine Global Health Faculty
Meet Our Global Health Faculty
In-Country Director of the Botswana Global Health Program
Dr. Kesegofetse Chabaesele joined the Botswana Harvard Partnership as a Medicine Site Director for Scottish Livingstone Hospital in July 2023. She holds a Master degree in Medicine Family Medicine from the University of Botswana (UBSOM). Her undergraduate and medical training was completed at University of the West Indies, St. Augustine Campus, (Trinidad and Tobago).
Dr. Chabaesele is passionate about community building and the importance of community based primary health care. has served in the public sector at various positions across the country since the year 2009. She has worked across all levels of health care, from primary to tertiary care and has engaged across multiple domains of clinical stewardship, program management, mentorship, and education. Her last post was coordinator for the DHMT (District Health Management Team) of Greater Selibe Phikwe, located in eastern Botswana. In this role, she facilitated international accreditation of the Selibe Phikwe Government hospital (COHSASA), and oversaw health coordination, leadership, and management for the region. Prior to this, she worked in Nyangabgwe hospital and Mahalapye District hospitals. Dr. Chabaesele serves on multiple national committees and technical working groups within the Botswana Ministry of Health, including the National Adverse Events Following Immunization Committee and Malaria Care Audit Committee.
Apart from medical work, she has worked with several teams to promote education in Botswana - for example Segotwana club, and SHS 2000. She is Co-Founder of Ladies with Purpose, a registered NGO which promotes girl child education for girls from more challenged socioeconomic backgrounds.
Director, Internal Medicine Residency Global Health Program and Global Health Fellowship
Associate Program Director, Internal Medicine Residency Program
Assistant Professor, Harvard Medical School
Dr. Jonathan Crocker is a hospitalist at BIDMC. He graduated from UMass Medical School and completed his residency and chief residency at Boston Medical Center in 2001. After working as a primary care clinician at Massachusetts General Hospital for nearly six years, Dr. Crocker moved to rural Malawi as Director of Clinical Services with Abwenzi Pa Za Umoyo (Partners In Health), Malawi. In this role, he supported and augmented clinical services focused on HIV, TB and malaria at the district level, oversaw the creation of Chronic Care and Kaposi Sarcoma clinics, and supported the growth of medical inpatient services at Neno district hospital, after it was built. Dr. Crocker joined the BIDMC medicine faculty in the summer of 2009. He completed a Rabkin Fellowship in Medical Education in 2011-2012. He is an Associate Program Director, and directs the Global Health Program (track and elective) within the IM residency program. He founded and directs the new Global Health Fellowship in Medicine at BIDMC. Prior global health experience includes research and clinical work in Nicaragua, Ecuador, Guatemala, and Honduras. Dr. Crocker's academic interests include health care delivery in resource-poor settings, mentorship of residents in global health activities, resident and hospitalist procedural training, and graduate medical education. He also directs the Katherine Swan Ginsburg Humanism in Medicine Program within the residency program.
Director of Ethics and Palliative Care Programs
Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School
President of The Albert Schweitzer Fellowship
Dr. Lachlan Forrow earned his MD from Harvard Medical School (HMS) and was an Albert Schweitzer Fellow at the Schweitzer Hospital in Lambaréné, Gabon. He completed residency at Rhode Island Hospital/Brown University, and General Internal Medicine and Ethics fellowships at Harvard.
For over 25 years, he has been active in the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW), which was honored in 1985 with the Nobel Peace Prize, and has served as IPPNW's Chair of Board of Directors and CEO, as well as New England Regional Director of IPPNW's U.S. affiliate, Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR), and as a member of PSR during this time. He has served more recently as the organization's Parliamentarian and helps lead the organization's ICAN Campaign which seeks a Nuclear Weapons Convention, a treaty committing the world to the permanent, verifiable and enforceable elimination of nuclear weapons in a specified timetable.
Dr. Forrow also serves as President of The Albert Schweitzer Fellowship and as Vice President and the U.S. representative on the governing Council of The Albert Schweitzer Hospital in Lambaréné, Gabon, where senior U.S. medical students serve as Schweitzer Fellows and over 200 health professional students annually become US-based Schweitzer Fellows who engage in public service activities.
In 2007, Dr. Forrow was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award for Community Service from Harvard Medical School. He has lectured widely and published numerous articles and book chapters on issues in medical ethics education, palliative care, medical decision-making and the social responsibilities of physicians.
Medical Director, The Partnership for Health Advancement in Vietnam
Attending Physician, Division of Infectious Diseases, BIDMC
Assistant Professor in Medicine, Harvard Medical School
Dr. Pollack is an Infectious Diseases clinician at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Assistant Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, and the Medical Director of the Partnership for Health Advancement in Vietnam (HAIVN), a Harvard University Global Program with a mission to improve healthcare in Vietnam. He is also a Faculty Affiliate at the HMS Center for Primary Care and serves as Research Faculty in the of Division of General Medicine at BIDMC.
Dr. Pollack’s work focuses on strengthening healthcare systems in low- and middle-income countries and on improving access to quality and equitable care for people living with HIV and viral hepatitis. With funding from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Dr. Pollack provides technical assistance to the Vietnam Ministry of Health, advising on national HIV clinical guidelines and developing training curricula and programs. He has tested and scaled up innovative approaches to care delivery, healthcare worker capacity building, patient and community empowerment, and interventions to reduce stigma and discrimination in healthcare settings. He is also the Co-PI of the IMPACT-MED Alliance, a USAID-funded initiative to support medical education reform and improve infection control and antimicrobial stewardship in Vietnam.
Dr. Pollack is actively involved in teaching and training. He mentors trainees interested in global health, teaches Social Medicine and Infectious Diseases at HMS, and co-leads a weekly multi-disciplinary teaching conference on HIV primary care at BIDMC.
Dr. Pollack has received numerous awards and recognitions for his contribution to Vietnam's health sector, including the People’s Health Award from the Vietnam Ministry of Health in 2022. He also received an Honorary PhD Degree from the University of Medicine and Pharmacy at Ho Chi Minh City for contributions to the University’s curriculum reform.
Dr. Pollack graduated summa cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania with a major in History and Sociology of Science and Medicine. He received his MD from Temple University School of Medicine and completed a residency and chief residency in Internal Medicine and a fellowship in Infectious Diseases at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.
Instructor, Harvard Medical School
Dr. Beth Riviello is a pulmonary critical care physician at BIDMC and at the University Teaching Hospital of Kigali in Rwanda. She received her medical degree from Vanderbilt School of Medicine in 2006, spent a year working at a hospital in Angola, then completed the Internal Medicine and Global Health Equity residency at Brigham and Women's Hospital in 2011 with a focus on health care delivery in resource constrained settings. She completed the Harvard combined pulmonary and critical care fellowship in 2014 before joining the faculty at BIDMC. In Rwanda, she has been involved in research and educational initiatives in critical care through the Human Resources for Health program. Dr. Riviello's areas of interest are the translation of current evidence for critically ill patients to resource constrained settings, medical education, the epidemiology of critical illness in Rwanda, and respiratory failure and sepsis in resource constrained settings.
Faculty Director, Botswana Clinical Fellowship Program, Harvard Initiative for Global Health
Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School
Dr. Roger Shapiro is an Associate Professor in Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Harvard School of Public Health. His primary research interests are in Botswana, in the prevention of mother-to-child HIV transmission (PMTCT) and the reduction of morbidity and mortality among infants born to HIV-infected women through the Mashi Study in Botswana. He is the principal investigator of several studies evaluating virologic efficacy and HIV transmission rates among women receiving various antiretroviral combinations during pregnancy, delivery, and breastfeeding, and evaluating birth outcomes among HIV-infected and HIV-uninfected women in Botswana. He is a co-investigator for a pilot implementation study to provide male infant circumcision services in Botswana. Dr. Shapiro works closely with the Botswana PMTCT Programme, and is a member of the PMTCT Advisory Panel for the World Health Organization.
As Associate Director for Education at the Harvard Initiative for Global Health, he mentors Infectious Disease fellows, residents, and students in HIV research, and has helped to establish a Clinical Care and Research Fellowship at the Scottish Livingstone Hospital in Molepolole, Botswana to support fellows and junior faculty launch careers in HIV research.
Director, Global Neurology Program, Department of Neurology
Assistant Professor, Harvard Medical School
Dr. Omar Siddiqi is based in Lusaka, Zambia where he has been a Lecturer at the University of Zambia School of Medicine since 2010. He completed medical school at the University of Rochester, and completed his neurology residency and epilepsy fellowship at BIDMC. Dr. Siddiqi has a specific interest in neuroinfectious diseases. His research as a 2010/2011 Fogarty International Clinical Research Fellow and an American Academy of Neurology Clinical Research Training Fellow has focused on molecular diagnosis of CNS opportunistic infections in HIV-infected Zambian adults and evaluating the etiology of new onset seizures in HIV-infected Zambians. His current research looks at novel diagnostic tests and host susceptibility factors in tuberculous meningitis.
Associate Director, Internal Medicine Residency Global Health Program and Global Health Fellowship
Instructor, Harvard Medical School
Dr. Rebecca Zash is a member of the Division of Infectious Diseases at BIDMC and a Research Associate at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. She graduated from the University of North Carolina School of Medicine and then completed residency and fellowship training at BIDMC. Prior to medical school, Dr. Zash helped to run an NGO to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV (PMTCT) in South Africa. She has pursued interest and research in HIV in pregnancy. During her fellowship, she lived in Botswana and ran several research studies evaluating the safety of antiretroviral therapy in pregnancy and infant outcomes. Her current research interests include understanding the mechanisms of adverse birth outcomes among HIV-infected women in Botswana and implementing drug-safety surveillance in pregnancy in resource-limited settings.