Mozambique, a country in sub-Saharan Africa, has experienced a severe physician shortage for many years, with patients having particularly limited access to surgical care. Medical education and surgical research partnerships formed in 2010 between Universidade Eduardo Mondlane (UEM) in Mozambique and the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), is developing potential solutions to the nation’s surgical care crisis. The findings that have emerged from this initiative, which are aimed at scaling up surgical services, will likely have important implications for improving surgical care in Mozambique and other underserved nations.