Saki Thapa

Saki Thapa serves as the Advocacy, Networking, and Resource Mobilization Manager at BNMT Nepal. With a strong focus on project designing and grants application, she has demonstrated remarkable success in securing funds for numerous impactful initiatives. Notable among these are Health Link funded by UK aids, Enhancing Community Health funded by the Big Lottery Fund, Health Facilities Reconstruction and Health Service Strengthening I & II funded by AmeriCares, TB REACH Wave 5, Adolescents SRHR project funded by AmplifyChange, Project Horizon funded by BNMT UK, as well as the Global Fund projects 2017-2018 and 2018 to 2021. She has also contributed writing the projects – SUSTAIN: Emergency support and Sustenance to communities affected by crisis funded by AmeriCares, and COVID Kurakani, a supplement of COVID gene sequencing project, Epidemic Intelligence.

With an MSc in Public Health from the esteemed Berlin School of Public Health, Charité Universitätsmedizin, Berlin, Germany, Saki has taken the lead in successfully implementing three Sexual and Reproductive health and Rights projects (AmplifyChange, Butterfly, Project Horizon) in rural Sindhupalchowk, Nepal. She has also spearheaded the Research, Evidence and Development Initiative (READ-It) project, focusing on evidence synthesis tailored to national gaps; and the Breaking the Stigma project, which explores the feasibility and acceptability of self-sampling for HPV as an alternative method for cervical cancer screening. Additionally, Saki holds a master’s degree in Health Care Management from Pokhara University, Nepal.

As a valuable member of the senior management team, Saki has played a key role in the development of organizational policies, policy briefs, project briefs, reports, storybooks, and IEC/BCC materials. She has also contributed significantly to the strategic planning of BNMT, shaping the organization’s vision and direction in the strategic plan for 2020-2025.

Dr Khem Pokhrel

Khem is a global health professional with key expertise in designing, implementing, and evaluating Public Health Programs for more than 10 years in Nepal and abroad. He received MSc and PhD degrees in Global Health from The University of Tokyo, Japan. His primary areas of work comprise of Health System Strengthening, Global Burden of Disease Study, HIV, Nutrition, Mental Health, Digital Health, and Reproductive Health.

He worked for several research,  monitoring, and evaluation projects in various organization such as FACT project of Georgetown University, Washington DC, USA, Mental Health Project of CaMH, Canada, Care International, Family Health International, Save the Children International, and several other national organizations in Nepal. He has extensive research capacity and published multiple public health research articles in international indexed journals:

https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=hGfU2lgAAAAJ&hl=en

Samjhana Shrestha

Samjhana Shrestha is the Research Officer at BNMT Nepal for the READ-It project. Samjhana is a passionate public health researcher with a stock of experiences in health research; data management and statistical analysis; and application of Geographical Information System (GIS) in health research. She completed MPH under Erasmus Mundus Master’s Program in Public Health from The University of Sheffield, UK, and the EHESP School of Public Health, France. She has received academic training on Geographical Information System (GIS) from Sheffield Hallam University. Her areas of interest in research revolve around infectious and non-infectious diseases, maternal and child health, health inequalities, and geospatial health -understanding how built environment influences health behaviors and health outcomes. She has previously worked in Neighborhood Environments and Mobility: Effects on Social Health Inequalities cohort project for assessing the association between spatial accessibility to sports facilities and sports practice through developing various models; and the integrated nutrition project ‘Suaahara’ for implementing interventional activities at the field level for improving the health and nutritional status of mothers and children.