Meet our Team
Directors
Chiamaka Aneji, MD, MPH, FAAP, Pediatric Global Health Program Co-Director
Dr. Chiamaka Aneji completed her medical education at the College of Medicine, University of Nigeria Nsukka. Growing up on 2 different continents opened her eyes to the differences in health care she saw as a child in England and subsequently as a medical student in Nigeria. This piqued her interest in Global Health and set the stage for her medical career path.
Dr. Aneji firmly believes all newborns and children are entitled to accessible and quality Health Care. As a neonatologist, Neonatal Resuscitation Program instructor, and master trainer in the Helping Babies Survive program, she has trained trainers and providers in the United States and several resource-limited countries in newborn resuscitation and care. She provides clinical mentorship, volunteer telehealth support, and ongoing volunteer education support to health care workers in several hospitals in Nigeria.
Her goal is to combine her interests in Global Health, Quality Improvement, and Medical Education to improve the health of newborns and children both at home and abroad. She currently serves as the Associate Medical Director of the Children’s Memorial Hermann Hospital Houston neonatal intensive care unit.
Kristina Tebo, MD, Pediatric Global Health Program Co-Director
Dr. Kristina Tebo has been passionately involved in pediatric global health for over 15 years. While pursuing her medical degree at Baylor College of Medicine and completing her residency training at Northwestern University, Dr. Tebo completed a Global Health Track and spent several months rotating at hospitals in West Africa. She then focused her professional efforts in Togo, West Africa where she served as a pediatrician for nearly 3 years at the Karolyn Kempton Memorial Christian Hospital (KKMCH). During this time, Dr. Tebo worked as a pediatric hospitalist, mentored Togolese mid-level providers, completed quality improvement projects, led the hospital’s medical committee, oversaw the hospital supply chain, and served in many administrative roles.
After returning to the United States, Dr. Tebo was a Pediatric Hospitalist at the Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago (Northwestern University) before joined McGovern Medical School as an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics with the goal of advancing global health education and practice within the Department of Pediatrics. Since that time, she has also become the Assistant Vice President of Global Health Initiatives for UTHealth Houston. Her clinical interests include severe malaria, pediatric oncology in low resource settings, and malnutrition.
Global Health Faculty
Dr. Bista is a native of Nepal with interest in global health and management of critically ill children in both academic setting and low resource setting. He completed his Master of Public Health (MPH) and his Pediatric Critical Care Fellowship at UTHealth Houston.
He worked in various clinical setting in Nepal before moving to the USA. As part of his medical school internship in Nepal, he worked in Primary Health Care, government district and zonal hospitals, and tertiary care center. Subsequently, he worked as medical officer in tertiary cancer hospital in Nepal and sole physician in a hospital in rural Nepal. These experiences provided him with clinical acumen and organizational skills to perform at various healthcare settings in Nepal.
After completing his medical and public health training in the United States, he worked in medically underserved area in Rio Grandy Valley in South Texas. He is currently working to expand pediatric global health curriculum and experiences for pediatric subspecialty fellows.
In his spare time, he has run marathon races around Texas and is pursuing his graduate studies in Sanskrit language.
Dr. Fatima Boricha is an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Texas McGovern Medical School. She currently works at the UT Neonatal High-Risk Clinic as a high-risk pediatrician with a particular focus on caring for medically complex children.
Dr. Boricha earned her medical degree from The Dow University of Health Sciences in Karachi, Pakistan. She then completed her residency at The University of Texas Medical School in Houston, TX. Dr. Boricha is Board certified by The American Board of Pediatrics.
Dr. Boricha is deeply interested in caring for underserved communities and seeks to optimize healthcare provision for high-risk children in variably resourced regions. As a global health advocate, she wishes to bring best practices into medical education, especially in low-resource settings, and optimize collaborations between clinical and academic institutions in diverse settings.
Dr. Guenet Degaffe is a native of Ethiopia who is interested in Pediatrics and infectious diseases. She received her BA from Wartburg College in Waverly, Iowa before going to the University of New Mexico where she earned a masters degree in Biology and her medical degree. She completed her Pediatric residency training at UTHealth Houston where she continues to practice as a Pediatric Hospitalist.
Along with other medical members of the Ethiopian diaspora, Dr. Degaffe formed the medical non-profit “Global Initiatives for Better Health” (www.globh.org). This organization aims to support sustainable medical work in Ethiopia and sub-Saharan Africa.
Outside of medicine, Dr. Degaffe enjoys reading, writing, etymology, language, and travel.
Dr. Monaliza Evangelista is an Associate Program Director of Pediatrics Residency. Her interest in Global Health stems from her personal experiences growing up in a small community in the Philippines. Because of limited resources, this has allowed her to understand first-hand how to live in a setting with limited access to healthcare, and where healthcare is not considered a priority until necessary.
Dr. Evangelista completed medical school at the University of Texas Medica Branch and a residency in Internal Medicine-Pediatrics at UTHealth Houston. She now works as a Pediatric Hospitalist and serves as the Associate Program Director for the Pediatric Residency. As an Associate Program Director, Dr. Evangelista’s main goals in being involve in Global Health include creating a curriculum and local rotations for pediatric residents to gain global health experiences and knowledge in providing care for underserved patients.
Dr. Chelsea Gatcliffe is from the twin island nation of Trinidad and Tobago. After spending time in London during an undergraduate summer abroad, she decided to head ‘across the pond’ to start her medical training at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland. Her introduction to clinical medicine across various settings throughout Ireland was a formative experience and has remained a highlight of her training.
She trained in pediatrics at the University of Miami/ Jackson Memorial Hospital and went on to pursue pediatric pulmonology at UC San Diego/ Rady Children’s Hospital. She is now an Assistant Professor in the Division of Pulmonary Medicine at UTHealth Houston and the Director of the Pediatric Aerodigestive Clinic.
Houston’s Caribbean community and diverse patient population have renewed her interest in global health work and she is excited to engage with the pediatric community in Trinidad and the wider Caribbean region.
Program Coordinator
Yaki Swanson
713-500-7142
Yaki.B.Swanson@uth.tmc.edu