Emmy Okello, an Associate Professor in the Department of Medicine, Makerere University and Chief of the Division of Adult Cardiovascular Medicine, Uganda Heart Institute (UHI). He heads the rheumatic heart disease research collaborative at the UHI, a consortium of national and international researchers focused on reducing the burden of rheumatic heart disease (RHD) in Uganda and around the world.
Dr. Emmy Okello
Advisory board members
As a THRiVE-2 postdoctoral Fellow, Dr. Okello is exploring the epidemiology and pathogenesis of acute rheumatic fever in Lira District, Northern Uganda. This study is expected to improve the diagnosis of acute rheumatic fever diagnosis and contribute to the reduction of morbidity and mortality associated with RHD, the long-term consequence of rheumatic fever. He is mentored by Professor James Tumwine (Makerere), Dr. Andrea Beaton (Washington), Dr. Tom Parks (LSHTM) and Professor Jonathan Carapetis (Australia).
Okello graduated from Mbarara University School of Medicine with a Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery degree. He continued his studies at Wuhan University-Hubei, China graduating with a Master of Medicine degree in Internal Medicine. He earned his PhD from Makerere University in 2015. His doctoral thesis was titled- “Burden, Risk Factors and Outcome of Rheumatic Heart Disease in Uganda” it documents the high morbidity and mortality rates of RHD. Hereafter, he underwent a one-year fellowship in Interventional Cardiology at Case Western Reserve University, in Cleveland, Ohio, United States.
