Dilys Walker, MD
Biography
Dilys Walker MD is an Adjunct Professor with the Maternal and Child Health Program at the UC Berkeley School of Public Health. She has her primary appointment with the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Reproductive Sciences and Global Health Sciences at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). From 1998 to 2010, she worked in the Department of Reproductive Health at the National Institute of Public Health in Mexico. She is currently the Principal Investigator for the $25 million Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation-funded East African Preterm Birth Initiative at UCSF, aiming to reduce the burden of preterm birth in Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda. She received her medical degree from the University of California, San Diego, and completed a residency in Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Walker was the first Family Planning Fellow at UCSF. She is co-founder and Executive Director of PRONTO International, a non-governmental organization (NGO) that develops emergency obstetric and neonatal training programs grounded in low-tech, high-fidelity simulation and teamwork training for lower- and middle-income countries (LMICs). She is conducting PRONTO implementation trials in Mexico, Guatemala, Kenya, and India. Her research has focused on LMICs in the prevention of unplanned adolescent pregnancy, emergency obstetric care, abortion, family planning, and maternal mortality.
Research Interests
- Quality of maternity and neonatal care in low-resource settings
- Training and capacity building
- Emergency obstetric care
- Strategies to promote midwifery models of obstetric care in low-resource settings
- Implementation science
Education
- Family Planning Fellowship – University of California, San Francisco
- Obstetrics and Gynecology Residency – University of Pennsylvania Hospital
- MD – University of California, San Diego