Major W. Bradshaw has long been one of the talented physician-teachers that makes Houston Texas Medical Center such a fascinating place. Dr. Bradshaw came to Houston and the Baylor College of Medicine as an Assistant Professor of Medicine in 1972 to ramrod Baylor’s development of expertise in microbiology and immunology. An outstanding teacher, Dr. Bradshaw was promoted to Dean of Education in 1996 and to Senior Vice-President and Dean of Medical Education in 2004. Now, while most contemporaries are planning their retirement, the Chronicle’s Leigh Hopper reports that Dr. Bradshaw has other things in mind:

[After 30 years at Baylor], Bradshaw is making an unusual career move.
He’s heading to Botswana, a country in sub-Saharan Africa that is roughly the size of Texas.
Baylor is expected to announce this week that Bradshaw has accepted a job as interim founding dean at University of Botswana’s medical school, the first such school in a country with one of the world’s worst HIV rates. Next month, he and his wife move to Gaborone, Botswana’s capital, leaving their home, their children and grandchildren for at least a year.
“It’s pretty remarkable for (the University of Botswana) to have the sitting dean of education for the No. 10 medical school in the United States to all the sudden be their new founding dean,” said Baylor College of Medicine President Peter Traber. “That’s quite a recruitment.”

Dr. Bradshaw’s appointment is part of Baylor’s affiliation agreement with the University of Botswana, which is starting the country’s first medical school to address Botswana’s critical health needs, including a high percentage of the population that is infected with the HIV virus. Under the leadership of Baylor pediatric professor Mark Kline, Baylor has already opened a treatment center for HIV-infected children in Botswana in 2003 as a part of Baylor’s International Pediatric AIDS Initiative. What better legacy for a teacher such as Bradshaw — who has had a major influence on one of America’s finest medical schools — than to contribute his talents to the creation of a medical teaching institution in a part of the world that needs it the most. Just another example of the magnificent influence that the professionals of Houston’s remarkable Texas Medical Center are having throughout the world.