Dr Egere is on study leave from his job as a research clinician in the bacterial diseases programme at the United Kingdom's renowned Medical Research Council Laboratories, in The Gambia, West Africa.
He is also the first student to be supported by a scholarship from the University of Otago's recently-established Centre for International Health, whose Dunedin-born director is Prof Philip Hill.
Dr Egere said Prof Hill had been his manager, a clinical epidemiologist, and a "very important mentor" at the research laboratories in The Gambia and it was good to see him again.
He was "happy and excited" to have gained scholarship support for his master of public health degree studies. Establishing the centre had been a "wonderful" step, he said.
He will study in Dunedin this year, undertaking further research in The Gambia next year.
Gaining more experience in epidemiology and public health research was helping him see more of the wider picture of child health needs than was possible through clinical work alone, he said.
The university centre offers postgraduate training and qualifications to students from developing countries in Asia, the Pacific and Africa.
