Bridging the medical research gulf

Low base, high bar

Javaid Sheikh's enthusiasm for his new job is palpable.  In an interview for Al-Jazeera satellite television channel (yet to be aired), he says that as WCMC-Q's vice dean for research he can convince the world’s best researchers to come to Qatar to do their research on genomics and stem cells.  

Prof Sheikh, fresh in Qatar from Stanford University, also believes that in a handful of years, Qatar will be able to compete against  countries with far deeper roots in medical research, in Europe and North America. Medical science, he says, is at a unique juncture when you can bring research to new quarters, like Qatar, and be able to compete with the best in the world within five years.

Certainly the terms used to describe the project when it was first unveiled last March underline the state’s ambitions: “Sidra will achieve the highest international standards in patient care, teaching and research.”

It may be hard to envisage how Qatar can reach such a pinnacle.  After all, the country, like its Gulf neighbours, is resource-rich, but research-poor.  So Qatar has set out to make the contrast in that reality less glaring.  

Daniel Bergin, Sidra's executive project director, recognises that to attract the manpower necessary to achieve its goals the new centre has to have some unique features,

The trump card is the US$7.9 billion endowment - the largest of any medical centre anywhere.  Bergin says that Qatar Foundation’s stupendous endowment will, “ensure, in large part, the continuation of vital clinical and translational research to be conducted at Sidra."

The second attraction of Sidra, says the centre's chief, is its affiliation with the medical school of the Ivy-League Cornell University, “which will cement [the centre's] place among the most prestigious medical and research institutions in the world.”

Cornell is one of the Western universities to have opened branch campuses in Doha's Education City at the invitation of (and with generous sponsorship from) the Qatar Foundation, the institution which spearheads Qatar's education and research projects.  

Among the other schools hosted at the 25,000 acre campus are Carnegie Mellon University's business and computer science schools; Texas A&M School of Engineering and Georgetown's School of Foreign Service. [For more on this, see A tale of two sheikdoms].

Yet another unique feature of Sidra, Bergin adds, is that it, “will be one of the most technologically advanced medical centres in the world, perhaps the first truly all-digital facility.”

Also, with Cesar Pelli as its design architect, Sidra is an, “aesthetically beautiful place that will combine the look and feel of a luxury hotel with the high quality services of a world-class hospital,” says Bergin. 

Building the capacity

Sidra's triple mission of education, research and patient care is inspired by the mission of its renowned partner medical college, says Daniel Alonso, WCMC-Q's dean, in a yet-to-be-aired interview with Al-Jazeera.  This last academic year the school, which started in 2002, has graduated its first class.  Once Sidra is in operation, it, along with Hamad Medical Corporation, will be the place where the WCMC-Q graduates continue their training both as clinicians and researchers.

For the time being, however, efforts are underway to lure top-notch research talents to Qatar from, "wherever we can get them," says Prof Alonso.

Top researchers are needed, to fill the ranks in the three main areas, or "pillars" of Sidra’s research programme.  These pillars, according to Sidra's Bergin, are pregnancy health and infertility; developmental and preventative health; and  women's health.  

Under these broad pillars several sub-categories will be addressed, such as maternal and infant health in all phases of pregnancy and ways of reducing genetically based abnormalities; prevention and control of juvenile diabetes; and diseases that afflict adult women and have a high incidence of morbidity and mortality.

Those research areas, Bergin adds, will be supported by three core sciences and technologies: functional and anatomical imaging; stem cells; and genetics, genomics and proteomics.  He would not, however, name the sources of the stem cell lines to be used.

It is hoped that attracting world-class researchers to Qatar will fuel the development of home grown talent. Prof Sheikh recognises that the ultimate aim is to extend the roots of scientific research into the otherwise alien soil of Qatar, or as he expresses it, "to make research part of the [Qatari] culture."

To this end, the WCMC-Q, is to start an "ambitious" research programme this coming fall, targeting the "total span" of research disciplines, including basic research, clinical research and translational research.  "All of this is going to be done here in Qatar over the coming five years."  In parallel, Prof Alonso adds, the school is going to recruit a large number of scientists to "begin laboratories here in Doha, and the goal is to establish research capacity here."

Will they come?

Prof Alonso believes that Qatar offers an attractive combination: a country that has made significant investments in research and education and renowned educational institutions.  True, that combination could attract serious researchers. But, still, the day when scientists flock to Qatar may not yet be around the corner.  

That reality has already manifested itself in the fact that some of Education City branch campuses are reportedly having a difficult time trying to get faculty from the "main campuses" to teach in Doha.  Along with the fact that research in Qatar is just starting to get off the ground, the political instability in the Middle East is clearly taking its toll, contributing to the general perception that it is a research-averse region.

Because of this, Prof Alonso says that Qatar's new found interest in science and research could be particularly appealing to Arab scientists in Europe and North America who grew up in the region or have their families here.  The large number of Arab scientists who came to Qatar to attend the government-sponsored Founding Conference for Expatriate Arab Scientists in April 2006 may actually serve as a testimony to this.

Though Qatar's "combination" may prove attractive, its position is not unrivalled.  In August 2006, Imperial College in London partnered with the government of Abu Dhabi to launch the Imperial College London Diabetes Centre (ICLD) in the wealthiest of the seven emirates that compose the United Arab Emirates (UAE).  The mandate of ICLD includes carrying out "world-class research [on] why diabetes occurs at such high levels in the [UAE]," according to the ICLD web site. The incidence of diabetes in the UAE is estimated to be the highest in the world, affecting about 25 percent of all adults.

Saudi Arabia too is no stranger to partnerships with Western universities.  As far back as 1976, the biggest Gulf State invited Loma Linda University (LLU) of Southern California to offer the first American health degree programme in the Middle East.  Other Saudi hospitals, such as Dallah Hospital, now have venture capital arms that operate directly from the Silicon Valley and have FDA-approved medical devices in the world markets.

Qatar, UAE and Saudi Arabia have clearly taken different routes in modernising their healthcare and medical research infrastructure.  What they have in common is their recognition of the need to provide higher-quality healthcare to their peoples, and the need to look west to achieve that.  After all, notes WCMC-Q's research vice dean, education is about exposure.  

"Here we train our students on the methods and subject matter as in the New York campus, so the results will be the same," he says.