• Jebet Beverly Cheserem, Ignatius N Esene, Muhammad Raji Mahmud, Kazadi Kalangu, Samuila Sanoussi, Aaron Musara, El-GhandourNasser M FNMFDepartment of Neurosurgery, Cairo University, Cairo, Egypt., Graham Fieggen, and Mahmood Qureshi.
• Department of Neurosurgery, Weill Cornell, New York, New York, USA; Department of Neurosurgery, Aga Khan University Hospital, Nairobi, Kenya. Electronic address: bevjeb@yahoo.co.uk.
• World Neurosurg. 2021 Mar 1; 147: e8e15e8-e15.

BackgroundContainment measures for COVID-19 have affected surgical training globally. We sought to assess how neurosurgical training has been affected across Africa in April 2020.MethodsA cross-sectional survey was distributed to African Neurosurgical trainees seeking to review demographics and effects of COVID on training.ResultsA total of 123 neurosurgery trainees responded from 23 African countries and a further 6 were abroad. A total of 91.80% were men, and 96.70% were training in public institutions. Only 41% had received training in COVID-19 with 61.79% worried that they would contract COVID-19 while performing their clinical duties. There was a marked reduction in clinical activities including a median reduction of elective surgery (-80%), clinics (-83%), and emergency surgery (-38.50%). A total of 23.58% of residents did not receive a formal salary, with 50% on less than $1000 USD gross per month.ConclusionsThis is the first continental survey of neurosurgery trainees in Africa. COVID-19 has significantly affected clinical and learning opportunities. There are concerns of the long-term effects on their training activities for an uncertain period of time during this pandemic. Although there has been a global increase in e-learning, there is need to evaluate if this is accessible to all trainees.Copyright © 2020 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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