Håkon Angell Bolkan
Background and activities
My research is about scalable solutions to increase access to surgical services in low-income countries. In 2010, I established CapaCare, an organization offering medical training in areas lacking this competence. CapaCare has been active in Sierra Leone since 2010 and has extensive cooperation with NTNU, which in turn cooperates with other academic centers in Europe. We implement and test new ways to conduct surgical training and surgical service delivery in areas with little resources, we evaluate the effect and safety of task-sharing in surgery and obstetrics.
We have also examined how and if surgical procedures can be an indicator of a health system during major disasters, such as the West African Ebola outbreak in 2014-16.
Scientific, academic and artistic work
A selection of recent journal publications, artistic productions, books, including book and report excerpts. See all publications in the database
Journal publications
- (2021) Outcomes After Elective Inguinal Hernia Repair Performed by Associate Clinicians vs Medical Doctors in Sierra Leone: A Randomized Clinical Trial. JAMA Network Open. vol. 4 (1).
- (2021) Changes in surgical volume, workforce, and productivity in Sierra Leone between 2012 and 2017. Surgery.
- (2021) The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on hospital utilisation in Sierra Leone. BMJ Global Health. vol. 6 (10).
- (2021) Early evaluation of the transition from an analog to an electronic surgical logbook system in Sierra Leone. BMC Medical Education.
- (2021) Catastrophic expenditure and impoverishment after caesarean section in Sierra Leone: An evaluation of the free health care initiative. PLOS ONE. vol. 16 (10).
- (2020) Impact of surgical infrastructure and personnel on volume and availability of essential surgical procedures in Liberia. BJS Open. vol. 4.
- (2020) Outcomes of obstructed abdominal wall hernia: results from the UK national small bowel obstruction audit. BJS Open.
- (2020) Travel time and perinatal mortality after emergency caesarean sections: an evaluation of the 2-hour proximity indicator in Sierra Leone. BMJ Global Health. vol. 5:e003943 (12).
- (2020) Perinatal outcomes of cesarean deliveries in Sierra Leone: A prospective multicenter observational study. International Journal of Gynecology & Obstetrics. vol. 150 (2).
- (2019) Outcomes following small bowel obstruction due to malignancy in the national audit of small bowel obstruction. European Journal of Surgical Oncology. vol. 45.
- (2019) ”For this one, let me take the risk”: why surgical staff continued to perform caesarean sections during the 2014–2016 Ebola epidemic in Sierra Leone. BMJ Global Health. vol. 4.
- (2019) The rate and perioperative mortality of caesarean section in Sierra Leone. BMJ Global Health. vol. 4:e001605 (5).
- (2019) Malnutrition, nutritional interventions and clinical outcomes of patients with acute small bowel obstruction: results from a national, multicentre, prospective audit. BMJ Open.
- (2019) National prospective cohort study of the burden of acute small bowel obstruction. BJS Open.
- (2019) Evaluation of a surgical task sharing training programme's logbook system in Sierra Leone. BMC Medical Education. vol. 19 (1).
- (2019) Caesarean section performed by medical doctors and associate clinicians in Sierra Leone. British Journal of Surgery. vol. 106 (2).
- (2018) Admissions and surgery as indicators of hospital functions in Sierra Leone during the west-African Ebola outbreak. BMC Health Services Research. vol. 18 (846).
- (2018) Correction to: The Met Needs for Pediatric Surgical Conditions in Sierra Leone: Estimating the Gap. World Journal of Surgery.
- (2018) Macroeconomic costs of the unmet burden of surgical disease in Sierra Leone: A retrospective economic analysis. BMJ Open. vol. 8:e017824 (3).
- (2018) Comparison of surgical skill acquisition by UK surgical trainees and Sierra Leonean associate clinicians in a task-sharing programme. BJS Open.