Staff Profile - Anne Merriman
Honorary Teaching Fellow
Anne Merriman
Currently Founder and Director of Policy and International Programmes, Hospice Africa, Uganda, Anne has spent nearly all her professional life in developing countries. She first showed her love for Africa when she told her mother at the age of 4 that she was going to go to Africa to help look after the sick children when she grew up!
Now at the age of 71 she has spent 25 years in Africa and 7 years in SE Asia and only 8 years working in UK, where she was born.
After graduating at UCD, Ireland in 1963, she went to Nigeria as a Medical Missionary of Mary, immediately after her pre registration year in 1964 and was there over a period of 10 years. During this time she was hands on in surgery, obstetrics, paediatrics and medicine. She also acquired her early post graduate degrees in this period.
After returning to UK, she specialised in Geriatric Medicine in 1974, while residing in UK to look after her elderly Mother 1973 to1981. This is when she first became interested in the needs of the terminally ill. She introduced palliative care into Singapore in 1984, when she undertook initial research into the needs of those dying from cancer, while Senior Teaching Fellow in the Department of Social and Preventative Medicine (now COFM) in National University of Singapore. This was followed up by meeting the needs with a volunteer group of doctors and nurses, who visited patients in their own home and introduced the analgesic ladder to Singapore from 1985. This was all done in free time from working hours. Today this service is one of the best in SE Asia.
In 1990, she was invited to be the first Medical Director of Nairobi Hospice which opened in January 1990. It was while there that se realised the terrible suffering in a country where oncology was available only for the very few, and where patients usually presented at such a late stage that oncology was not suitable. After a publication in the journal CONTACT, published at the invitation of Dame Cicely Saunders, the editor, she received many letters from different African countries, asking her to assist their own people as the team were assisting in Nairobi. The inspiration to start a “model” affordable service for Africa started there.
In 1993, the “model” became a reality as Hospice Africa Uganda was commenced. This is now a success story in Uganda for Africa and even the world as they are the first country to allow specially trained Nurses to prescribe oral morphine, as recommended in 1996 by WHO for countries where there are insufficient prescribers to bring pain control to those suffering severe pain from cancer or HIV/AIDS.
Anne is also a founder member of the Palliative Care Association of Uganda (1999) and the founding Vice President. She is also a founder member of the African Palliative care Association and Vice Chair of the Board. She is a Board member of Hospice Africa UK and Hospice Africa Uganda. She is a Board Member of the International Association for Hospice and Palliative Care (IAHPC) since 2006.
Her contribution to health and relief of pain in the world has been recognised with the following awards:
- 2001 July: Honorary Fellowship of Liverpool John Moore’s University, for contribution to Medicine and relief of pain in the world.
- 2002 Jan: New Years Honors List (UK) awarded MBE for services to Health in Uganda
- 2002 Jan: Individual Award for Contribution to the Spread of palliative care in the World by International Association of Hospice and Palliative Care (IAHPC)
Anne has published more than 90 articles, 5 books and is editor and a peer reviewer for several journals. She is presently sought as a speaker for several international conferences per year and still is involved with bringing affordable and culturally appropriate palliative care to other African countries. She also has been acting Team Leader of the three Hospices in Uganda from October 05 to August 2006. She has now passed over the work in Uganda to Mrs Nina Shalita, the new CED.
She is looking forward to time and space within the next few years to take time to write more books, particularly re initiation and needs of palliative care in Africa.
Projects
