PhD Fellowship Opportunity at Zvitambo in Zimbabwe
- CREATE PhD Programme
- Apr 11
- 2 min read
Reference number ZI2501
Closing date - 30th April 2025
Applications are now open for a PhD fellowship based at the Zvitambo Institute for Maternal and Child Health Research in Zimbabwe.
This fellowship will contribute to the Co-SAM clinical trial, which is exploring new strategies to support full recovery in children hospitalised with severe acute malnutrition (SAM). Historically treated as a short-term illness, we now understand that children with complicated SAM often face a prolonged recovery, even after nutritional management and discharge from hospital. Approximately one-third of these children experience poor outcomes, including mortality, hospital readmission, or failed nutritional recovery.
The Co-SAM trial is evaluating three innovative post-discharge interventions among 1,266 children in Zimbabwe, Zambia, and Kenya:
Antimicrobial prevention: Using a combination of rifampicin, isoniazid, and azithromycin to prevent infections.
Therapeutic food reformulation: Developing more digestible, anti-inflammatory formulations to reduce metabolic stress.
Psychosocial support: Enhancing the caregiving environment through child play, solution-focused therapy, and caregiver peer support via income-generating activities.
Each intervention is being tested alone and in combination, against a standard-of-care group, to assess which strategies improve post-discharge outcomes.
The successful candidate will embed their PhD aims within the Co-SAM trial, which has opportunities for multiple sub-studies to maximise our learning about malnutrition. There is flexibility for the student to develop their own PhD ideas in collaboration with their supervisors. Depending on the area of focus, candidates can gain experience in qualitative and/or quantitative data analysis, laboratory molecular biology, and/or process evaluation. The trial runs until February 2028, and the fellow will contribute to ongoing data and specimen collection, as well as the analysis of trial outcomes through to the end of 2028.
For more information, and to access the application form and equal opportunities form, please see the documents below. Any queries or questions should be emailed to create-phd@lshtm.ac.uk
Please send the completed application form and equal opportunities form to create-phd@lshtm.ac.uk by 30th April 2025. Interviews will be held in May 2025 at Zvitambo.
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