Hammouda Bellamine has spent the last several days meeting with officials at UNC's School of Medicine to determine how the UNC group -- called Intrah -- can best help respond to recent violence in the West Bank.
Bellamine, Intrah's director of performance improvement and training, said the group has decided to focus for the next six months on providing emergency relief in the West Bank rather than on developing long-term health care in the entire region.
The West Bank area is a strip of land that was occupied by Palestine until 1948 when Jordan took control. Israel has controlled the land since 1967.
In addition to providing medical equipment and aid, officials plan to increase emergency obstetric care for pregnant women and to use UNC professors' expertise to develop distance-learning programs that offer technical support to health-care providers on the front line.
Intrah has been providing health-care training in the Middle East since 1979. But Bellamine said a recent influx of patients because of violence in the West Bank has forced Intrah staff to redirect efforts toward caring for victims.
"Instead of focusing on long-term development, we have had to shift our efforts to respond to the emergencies and crises," Bellamine said.
Bellamine, whose office is located in the West Bank, said shortages of supplies and equipment in the region have made Intrah's mission increasingly difficult.
Intrah Director James Lei said that while the West Bank is defined as a developing region, the health-care providers in the area are more qualified than those in other developing countries.
But strife in the area has prevented health-care providers from being able to operate normally. Bellamine said roadblocks in the area have proved increasingly dangerous, keeping both people in need and health-care professionals from reaching the hospitals.
