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Showing results for tags 'Africa'.
Found 37 results
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Content ArticleThis study in the Journal of Patient Safety and Risk Management aimed to assess the patient safety situation in Ghana across the World Health Organization's (WHO’s) 12 action areas of patient safety. The authors used interviews and observation including a WHO adapted questionnaire across 16 selected hospitals, including two teaching hospitals selected from the northern and southern parts of the Ghana. The key strength identified in the patient safety situational analysis was knowledge and learning in patient safety, while patient safety surveillance was the weakest action area identified. There were also weaknesses in areas such as national patient policy, healthcare associated infections, surgical safety, patient safety partnerships and patient safety funding.
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Content ArticleThis study in PLOS ONE assessed the frequency of adverse event reporting in Ghanaian hospitals, the patient safety culture determinants of the adverse event reporting and the implications for Ghanaian healthcare facilities. The authors found that the majority of health professionals had at least reported adverse events in the past 12 months across all 13 healthcare facilities studied. The patient safety culture dimensions were statistically significant in distinguishing between participants who frequently reported adverse events and otherwise.
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Content ArticleThis study in BMJ Open Quality aimed to assess the patient safety status in selected hospitals in Ghana. The authors concluded that the current patient safety status in the hospitals in the study was generally good, with the highest score in the knowledge and learning in the patient safety domain. Patient safety surveillance was identified as the weakest action area.
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News Article
Historic go-ahead for malaria vaccine to protect African children
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Children across much of Africa are to be vaccinated against malaria in a historic moment in the fight against the deadly disease. Malaria has been one of the biggest scourges on humanity for millennia and mostly kills babies and infants. Having a vaccine - after more than a century of trying - is among medicine's greatest achievements. The vaccine - called RTS,S - was proven effective six years ago. Now, after the success of pilot immunisation programmes in Ghana, Kenya and Malawi, the World Health Organization says the vaccine should be rolled out across sub-Saharan Africa and in other regions with moderate to high malaria transmission. Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the WHO, said it was "a historic moment". "The long-awaited malaria vaccine for children is a breakthrough for science, child health and malaria control," he said. "[It] could save tens of thousands of young lives each year." Read full story Source: BBC News, 6 October 2021 -
Content ArticleThis report by the Access to Medicine Foundation looks at how the pharmaceuticals industry can help tackle antimicrobial resistance (AMR) by improving access to medicines. It sets out how the unstable antibiotic market, with its fragile supply chains and tough market conditions, hinders the development of robust models that would allow medications to be more easily distributed and accessed. It features six case studies where companies and their partners are using a combination of access strategies to cut through the complexity and address access at a local level.
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Content Article
Sierra Leone has one of the highest rates of maternal mortality in the world. The risks are even greater for teenage girls who become pregnant, with up to one in ten dying in childbirth. In this blog, Lucy November, co-founder of 2YoungLives, a mentoring project for pregnant teenagers, describes the risks faced by teenage girls in Sierra Leone and the barriers they face to accessing maternity care. She talks about how 2YoungLives is making pregnancy and birth safer for this vulnerable group through mentoring, building community and equipping young mothers to support themselves and their babies. -
Content ArticleIn Sierra Leone, 34% of pregnancies and 40% of maternal deaths are amongst teenagers and risks are known to be higher for younger teenagers. This qualitative study in Reproductive Health aimed to explore the causes of this high incidence of maternal death for younger teenagers, and to identify possible interventions to improve outcomes. Through focus groups and semi-structured interviews, the authors identified transactional sex - including sex for school fees, sex with teachers for grades and sex for food and clothes - as the main cause of high pregnancy rates for this group. They also identified gendered social norms for sexual behaviour, lack of access to contraception and the fact that abortion is illegal in Sierra Leone as factors meaning that teenage girls are more likely to become pregnant. Key factors affecting vulnerability to death once pregnant included abandonment, delayed care seeking and being cared for by a non-parental adult. Their findings challenge the idea that adolescent girls have the necessary agency to make straightforward choices about their sexual behaviour and contraceptives. They identify a mentoring scheme for the most vulnerable pregnant girls and a locally managed blood donation register as potential interventions to deal with the high rate of maternal death amongst teenage girls.
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Content ArticleThis article in DIA Global Forum examines a new collaboration between the European Commission, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) EU Member States Belgium, France, and Germany, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the recently established African Medicines Agency (AMA). The group will mobilise more than €100 million over the next five years to support the AMA and other African medicines regulatory initiatives at regional and national levels. The initiative will foster collaboration and sharing of technical expertise by European regulators with AMA. It also aims to assist African national regulatory authorities (NRAs) in achieving the minimum World Health Organization (WHO) requirements for effective regulatory oversight of quality-assured, safe, local production of medicines and vaccines.
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Content ArticleThis study in the SA Journal of Human Resource Management aimed to develop a conceptual framework that identifies the critical success factors that affect the implementation of team coaching in organisations. The results indicate that to integrate successful team coaching into any organisation, effective analysis of an organisational context is required. This includes leadership stakeholders, team effectiveness, competency of a coach and employee engagement. The study also identified constraints that may prevent successful implementation of team coaching.
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Content ArticleIn this blog, Eve Namisango, Programs and Research Manager at the African Palliative Care Association, looks at the importance of patient and public involvement and engagement (PPIE) in palliative care research. She highlights recent work with the Uganda Cancer Society to explore best practices for engaging patients and caregivers and looks at key issues to consider when structuring PPIE in research.
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Content ArticleVery little is known about the actual harm that occurs to patients in developing or transitional countries, although the available evidence suggests that they may have an even higher risk of suffering patient harm. Understanding the magnitude of the problem and the underlying factors represents the first step towards improvement. The World Health Organization (WHO) is making a concerted effort, in different parts of the world, to identify the main issues affecting safe care in developing and transitional countries and to use these data to begin to developing and implementing effective solutions.
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Content ArticleThe United Nations 2015 Millennium Development Goals targeted a 75% reduction in maternal mortality. However, in spite of this goal, the number of maternal deaths per 100,000 live births remains unacceptably high across Sub-Saharan Africa. Because many of these deaths could likely be averted with access to safe surgery, including cesarean delivery, Epiu et al. set out to assess the capacity to provide safe anaesthetic care for mothers in the main referral hospitals in East Africa. The authors identified significant shortages of both the personnel and equipment needed to provide safe anaesthetic care for obstetric surgical cases across East Africa. There is a need to increase the number of physician anaesthetists, to improve the training of non-physician anaesthesia providers, and to develop management protocols for obstetric patients requiring anaesthesia. This will strengthen health systems and improve surgical outcomes in developing countries. More funding is required for training physician anaesthetists if developing countries are to reach the targeted specialist workforce density of the Lancet Commission on Global Surgery of 20 surgical, anaesthetic, and obstetric physicians per 100,000 population by 2030.
