Sustainability and task shifting in Africa

Recently Kathryn Chu and colleagues  wrote  a very good discussion on the topic of using non-physician clinician in emergency surgery (see Chu K, Rosseel P, Gielis P, Ford N (2009) Surgical Task Shifting in Sub-Saharan Africa. PLoS Med 6(5): e1000078. doi:10.1371/journal.pmed.1000078)

In a response to their paper, I wrote a comment on PLoSMedicine:

Kathryn Chu and colleagues are to be commended for their paper on “Surgical Task Shifting in Sub-Saharan Africa”.

I work on a project to train non-physician clinicians (NPC) in Emergency Obstetrics and surgery in south Ethiopia. The Ministry of Health collaborates and recognizes the training. It is a programme for public institutions, and it consists of four months basic training, followed by two months of supervisory visits to their home institutions. An important part of the project is also to support the peripheral institutions with essential equipment.

Our experience is similar to those from Mozambique and shows that using NPC for essential surgery and obstetrics is workable. Complication rates are low. As expected, we see that staff with some years of clinical experience perform better that those coming directly from school.

As many institutions have only one trained NPC, their sustainability is often threatened, and work might be discontinued during week-ends, vacations and needed travels. Each institution needs more than one team to become sustainable.

Too often, staff receive training and acquire basic skills to return to their home institution where it is not possible to do the tasks they trained for because of lack of follow up, surgical equipment or materials. For programmes to succeed, we think it is important to continue supporting the peripheral institutions.

As most peripheral hospitals and health centres are public, and to ensure sustainable performance, we believe the national or regional health authorities should own or be a part of the programme. This would allow for needed professional and political recognition, provision of necessary incentives and continued recruitment of essential staff.

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