Mr Mwayi Kachapila

• MSc Health Economics in Health Economics, University of Leeds 2017
• Bachelor of Social Science majoring Economics, University of Malawi 2010

Mwayi Kachapila joined the University of Birmingham in 2019. Prior to that, he worked for the Ministry of Health in Malawi as a health economist responsible monitoring and evaluation.

Since joining the University of Birmingham Mwayi has been conducting preliminary economic evaluations of planned randomised clinical trials in abdominal surgery. He has been developing decision analytic models for assessing the potential cost-effectiveness of perioperative respiratory care interventions of reducing postoperative complications in low-and middle-income countries.  

Currently Mwayi is giving health economics input on the planned PENGUIN trial and involved in a project aimed at estimating the economic burden of untreated surgical conditions focusing on LMICs.

During the 2021/22 academic year, Mwayi will support teaching of the Introduction to Health Economics module by delivering a lecture on economic evaluation in an international context.

• Health Economics and Health Policy MSc/Diploma

Mwayi’s research interests are mainly on economic evaluations of surgical interventions in low-and middle-income countries (LMICs). His most recent research have been focused pre-trial and preliminary economic evaluation of perioperative interventions among patients undergoing elective and emergency abdominal surgery in LMICs. As part of this work, a preliminary economic evaluation assessing the cost-effectiveness of preoperative mouthwash at reducing pneumonia was presented and the 2021 winter HESG conference and published in PLOS ONE.

Apart from research, Mwayi is also involved in building capacity among surgical staff in LMICs aimed at improving surgery resource allocation. He has been involved in training surgical staff from LMICs in basic health economics and application of the economic principles to resource allocation in surgical interventions.

Current projects

Mwayi is currently providing health economics input on the planned PENGUIN trial, which aims at assessing the safety and effectiveness of perioperative interventions among abdominal surgery patients.  

Mwayi is also involved in estimating the economic burden of untreated surgical conditions across the world focusing on LIMICs.

• NIHR Global Health Research Unit on Global Surgery
  
• Member- Health Economics Study Group –UK