Capacity building and health worker training
Building strategic partnerships in education and health in Africa: consultative meeting on improving collaboration between health professionals, governments and other stakeholders in human resources for health development
Information and collaboration required to develop human resources strategies for African countries
Authors:
; WHO Regional Office for Africa
Publisher:
World Health Organization , 2002
This report records highlights from the 2002 consultative meeting in Ethiopia between the World Health Organization (WHO), the World Bank and various Africa stakeholders in the development and management of human resources (HR) for health. The objective of the meeting was to improve collaboration between health professionals, governments and other stakeholders in HR for health development. Agreed areas of focus included: ensuring relevant education and training for health professionals; forging partnerships between health and education sectors; improving health-care providers’ work environment; and recognising and reacting to the impact of HIV and AIDS on the health workforce.
The meeting identified a number of key issues, including: lack of information available to and consultation with health care providers; the need for best practice information on reform experiences; the need for state-controlled regulation and accreditation; and the lack of reviews of educational institutions and programmes.
The meeting agreed that country-specific action plans needed to be developed in collaboration with country-level stakeholders. Consequently, more information on the workforce, health training institutions, budgets and financing was needed to support this process. The creation of an international African task force on HR development was recommended to assist the strategy development and mobilise funds for analysis and consensus building. [adapted from author]
