Physiology
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Browsing Physiology by Subject "Africa"
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Item Filling the Gap for Healthcare Professionals Leadership Training in Africa: The Afya Bora Consortium Fellowship(Annals of Global Health, 2017-02) Mashalla, Yohana J.Program/Project Purpose: The Afya Bora Consortium is a partnership of five African and four U.S. universities with the mission of providing future global health leaders with advanced skills that are beyond the traditional patient-centered training programs for healthcare professionals. Each year, an interdisciplinary group of twenty physicians, nurses and public health professionals participate in a 12-month African-based intensive fellowship to improve skills in leadership, resource management, program monitoring and evaluation, implementation, and applied research. Structure/Method/Design: The Afya Bora Fellowship provides leadership training in the form of eight in-person and four online modules as well as two 4.5-month mentored attachments at governmental and non-governmental organizations in Botswana, Cameroon, Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda. The fellows come together during three, month-long highly interactive sessions held in different African countries during which interdisciplinary and multinational learning is encouraged. Afya Bora Fellows complete evaluations of the modules and program as well as self assessments of learning throughout the year. Data presented here are from all cohorts since 2011 using qualitative analysis of personal reflection reports. Outcome & Evaluation: Fellows described multiple training gaps the fellowship helped fill. Fellows reported that increased skills in communication would help them to better motivate and align others to address pressing problems in their healthcare systems. Improved understanding of and capacity to use data for programmatic purposes was also identified as essential to their ongoing leadership. Fellows reported that their organizational and management abilities had improved both from didactic learning and modeling of program faculty and staff. Finally, fellows reported that the rich cohort experience provided them with an added appreciation of the advantages of interdisciplinarity when solving problems. Going Forward: Well-structured and targeted leadership training is necessary to fill the gaps in traditional medical and nursing education programs. Such training can catalyze healthcare professionals to become more effective in leadership and improve the healthcare systems in their countries while not contributing to “brain drain” (all fellows thus far have remained in their respective countries). The Afya Bora Fellowship can serve as a model for training and research institutions as well as organizations in resource-limited settings to sustainably strengthen human resource capacity to lead and improve health systems.Item Leadership training to build sustainable workforces and improve health in Africa(Annals of global health, 2016-06) Mashalla, Yohana J.Item Proceedings of the seminar on health research ethics in Africa.(Acta Tropica, 2001-01-15) Mashalla, Yohana J.The first conference of the African Malaria Vaccine Testing Network (AMVTN) identified as a leading priority, the promotion of ethics in health research undertaken in Africa. The participants at the 1995 meeting expressed the need for mainly increasing awareness of ethics in health research and of reviewing current practices and existing guidelines. The conference also noted that there were very limited national health research capacity, and the continuing reliance on non-African participation in health research on African health issues, and the attendant short-comings thereof, including inherent ethics issues. From its founding about 5 years ago, AMVTN in all its capacity building endeavours, particularly in its workshops on study designs and methodology, good clinical practice (GCP), and data management, has identified promotion of ethics to be a top priority. This activity being such a major challenge required considerable preparations, which started in earnest during 1997. It was decided very early that a workshop would not suffice and a conference would lack sufficient focus. It was therefore decided to organize a Seminar on Health Research Ethics in Africa. After wide ranging consultations, the relevant topics and respective speakers were identified and invited.Item Training tomorrow’s leaders in global health: impact of the Afya Bora Consortium Fellowship on the careers of its alumni(BMC medical education, 2016-09-19) Mashalla, Yohana J.Background Effective leadership is a cornerstone of successful healthcare delivery in resource limited settings throughout the world. However, few programs in Africa prepare healthcare professionals with the leadership skills vital to the success of the healthcare systems in which they work. One such program, the Afya Bora Consortium Fellowship in Global Health Leadership, has been training health professionals since 2011. The purpose of this study was to assess what career changes, if any, the Afya Bora Fellowship’s alumni have experienced since completing the fellowship, and to describe those changes. Methods The Afya Bora Fellowship is a multidisciplinary, one-year training program that teaches health professionals leadership skills through didactic and experiential learning in four African countries. Between January 2011 and June 2013 the consortium trained 42 nurses and doctors. In November 2013, an electronic survey was sent to all alumni to assess their performance in the workplace post-fellowship. Results Thirty-one (74 %) of 42 alumni completed surveys. Twenty-one (68 %) reported changes to their position at work; of those, sixteen (76 %) believed the change was due to participation in the fellowship. All alumni reported improved performance at work, and cited the application of a wide range of fellowship skills, including leadership, research, communication, and mentoring. Twenty-six (84 %) alumni spearheaded improvements in their workplaces and almost all (97 %) remained in contact with colleagues from the fellowship. Among the respondents there were five publications, nine manuscripts in preparation, and three international conference presentations. Conclusions Afya Bora alumni overwhelmingly reported that the one year fellowship positively influenced both their work and career trajectory. Training health professionals in leadership skills through didactic modules with the opportunity to apply learned skills at attachment sites in the Afya Bora Fellowship has an impact on performance in the workplace and the potential to improve long-term institutional capacity.