Dr Juliana Chizo Agwu. (Chizo Agwu) MBBS, MRCP, PCME, MSc, FRCPCH,
Chizo is currently the Chief Medical Officer at Wye Valley NHS Trust Hereford, where she works with the executive board of the directors to ensure the provision of good health services for the residents of Herefordshire and Powys. She is a Consultant Paediatrician in Diabetes and Endocrinology. She has previously held many national and International leadership roles including being Vice Chair of National Institute for Health and Care Excellence Diabetes Update Committee (NICE), a member of the advisory council of International Society of Paediatric and Adolescent Diabetes (ISPAD), President of the Association of Children’s Diabetes Clinicians UK. In those roles she led in developing national guidelines, influencing policy that have contributed to improving the care of children and young people with diabetes. She is a fellow of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health and has represented the Royal College as external MRCPCH examiner in several countries including Egypt, Oman, Saudi Arabia, and UAE..
In her spare time, she is contributing to improving care of children with diabetes living in sub-Saharan Africa; There are approximately 114,000 children with diabetes in Africa and their outcomes are poor , with high rates of complications . Using her expertise, Chizo conceived the course (Allied Healthcare Paediatric Diabetes Educator course for Africa (ADECA) about 4 years ago.
She has led a team of other international volunteers to develop the curriculum. ADECA is a 1 year hybrid course and is the first certified course for training Paediaric Diabetes Nurse Educators in sub-Saharan Africa. She travels twice a year to Tanzania to volunteer as Course Director as well as giving up some of her evenings to teach on the online phase of the course. The first cohort of ADECA trained nurses graduated in 2023 and consisted of 15 nurses from 7 countries (Nigeria, Ghana, Tanzania, Kenya, Malawi, Uganda, Cameroon). The trained nurses are now contributing to training others as well as contributing to improving care in their country of origin. The 2nd cohort of nurses from 9 sub-Saharan African countries started the course in June of 2024