Dr Turyahabwe Stavia, is the Assistant Commissioner at the National Tuberculosis and Leprosy Division of the Uganda Ministry of Health. Has a Bachelor’s degree in Medicine and Surgery from Mbarara University of Science and Technology and a Master’s degree in Public Health from Lund University Sweden. Has attended short courses in TB research, capacity building for Health workers, field epidemiology and surveillance, tuberculosis and HIV/IDs management, leadership and management courses.
Dr Stavia has over 20 years of experience working with both government and non-governmental organizations addressing global health issues including; HIV AIDs, Tuberculosis, Leprosy, Surveillance for diseases. Research interest is in optimizing the implementation and of scale up of novel tools to improve Tuberculosis care delivery. During her time at the TB program, she has initiated a number of research projects as principal investigator including; a) a study to evaluate the feasibility of Integrating interferon gamma release assay (IGRA) testing into provision of tuberculosis preventive therapy; b) a study to evaluate the feasibility of integrating Leprosy systematic contact follow up and post exposure prophylaxis (PEP) into the routine Leprosy care in Uganda; c) a study to evaluate the effectiveness of the modified WHO recommended shorter treatment regimen for drug resistant Tuberculosis in Uganda; and d) Improving utilization of TB-Lipoarabinomannan (LF-LAM) testing using data driven quality improvement approaches.
