The facilitation team
The year 2014 is coming to an end. To draw key lessons from the various activities undertaken during the past 12 months, the facilitators of the CoPs under the auspices of the International Partnership “Harmonization for Health in Africa”, met for two days in Rabat, at the National School of Public Health. In this blog post, we review the achievements and shortcoming of the CoPs during the year 2014.
The CoPs
The number of CoPs affiliated to HHA continues to grow. You are probably already familiar with the CoPs “Financial Access to Health Services”, “E-med” (in French only), “Performance Based Financing”, “Health Systems Planning & Budgeting” and “Health Service Delivery”. In Rabat, we became aware of the programmes and priorities of two new CoPs: one focused on “Human Resources for Maternal, Neonatal and Child Health” (in French only) and the other on Quality of Care in Referral Hospitals in Africa (in French only). Our meeting in Rabat was also an opportunity, to review the joint activities undertaken by many of our CoPs during the year. Our first experiences with joint inter-CoP/collaborative activities encourages us to believe that this is the road to take in the future. We also need to stay focused on strengthening the facilitation team. A step towards this was taken in 2014 and we hope to accelerate this progress in 2015.
Face-to-Face Events
In 2013, we organized two regional conferences (Dakar & Ouagadougou) and two international workshops (Bergen & Antwerp). While all these face-to-face events were judged a success, they left several members of the facilitation teams feeling drained and tired. The lesson learned was that, as valuable and enriching as they are, we had to be more modest in the future with regard to face-to-face events.
Hence, in 2014, we only organized one major event: the « ICT 4 RBF : When technological innovation meets health care financing innovation » meeting (28/4-1/5 Bujumbura). However, in an attempt to continue to foster face-to-face meetings among CoP members, we took advantage of major events organized by others. This is was particularly the case with the AfHEA conference in Nairobi, where we had a stand, and the regional conference in Dakar on budget analysis and advocacy for health, which we co-organized.
We were also present at the third global symposium on health systems research in Cape Town, where we had our own satellite session, co-organized another satellite session and had a stand, which was visited by a large number of participants. Last but not the least, the year came to a close with 2 meetings in Rabat: one gathering the facilitators of the various CoPs and the other to launch the second phase of the collaborative Muskoka project on health financing.
Collaborative Projects: The Muskoka Study
We had hoped for 2014 to be a year of consolidating the added value of CoPs, and a year when we wrapped up ongoing projects. For the Financial Access to Health Services and Performance Based Financing CoPs, the priority was the “Muskoka” project. This project was deemed strategic, as it mobilized experts from both CoPs: If we were able to successfully undertake such a collaborative research project in such a large number of countries (12), we could affirm our capacity to develop an original niche in global health, that of collaborative comparative research among countries.
The Muskoka study produced the results we were hoping for and provided important evidence about one of the main challenges facing implementing universal health coverage in Francophone Africa: that of the serious level of fragmentation of various health financing schemes at the country level. These results were disseminated widely at both the national and international levels.
The interest in this collaborative study and the growing attention accorded to our CoPs, has made us realize that an informal relationship based on mutual trust and confidence is being developed with various Ministries of Health. In a call to participate in Phase 2 of the Muskoka study, 11 countries sent a formal letter of request to participate in the study, signed either by the Ministers of Health themselves or the Secretaries Generals of the Ministries of Health.
Online forums
We must admit that the focus put on the Muskoka research study probably had a negative impact on some of our other activities. Indeed, if our online discussion forums remain an essential and integral activity to keep expert-members aware of recent technical developments in their field of interest, some of our forums have unfortunately been less dynamic this year as compared to previous years. We are aware that some of our forums are underutilized today. It is difficult for us to assess the impact or importance of the information that is being shared, and we are not very satisfied with the way in which we organize our discussions and debates in two languages. For some CoPs, the main challenge has been the limited availability of facilitators. We hope to address this problem in 2015, but to us it is clear that the dynamism of our online discussion forums will continue to rely on your individual and collective contributions.
Many CoPs prepare regular newsletters and statistics have confirmed that these, are widely read. However, some of these CoPs, will have to find a way to progressively encourage their audience to become more interactive. In Rabat, we further discussed our collaborative project of organizing inter-CoP webinars.
Blogs
Blogs are an important resource for our CoPs. They enable us to share in-depth analysis on a particular topic, showcase the important research and field work of our members, and enable us to share and discuss with other key experts beyond our members. It is important for us to remember, however, that one of the main objectives of these blogs is to showcase our expert-members. Did you know that one of our experts from Central Africa was contacted by three organizations after publishing his highly viewed blog?
The health financing CoPs continue to invest in their “Health Financing in Africa blog” depending on the urgencies at hand and on the availability of an overly busy editorial team. The blog performancebasedfinancing.org is often used during events organized by the CoP PBF itself. The blog santemondiale.org promotes the Politiques Internationales de Santé newsletter (in French) and the blog health4africa.net, focuses on publishing the work of the CoP-Health Service Delivery. We realize that managing all these blogs is a heavy and demanding task, which is why we will likely try to consolidate these activities in 2015.
Mobilizing funds
One of the key activities of the facilitation team is to mobilize sufficient funding for the various activities of the CoPs. In 2014, our long-term partners, notably UNICEF & the French Muskoka Fund, renewed their structural support to the CoPs. Other partners continue to provide support for specific activities, for example the World Bank supported the Bujumbura workshop and Cordaid supported the Muskoka study. We have also made new partnerships. The Belgian cooperation will be financing some of our activities for the period 2014-2016 and we are particularly happy about a new collaboration with the WHO P4H network, who supported our launch workshop for Phase 2 of the Muskoka study in Rabat. But perhaps we are most hopeful about an exciting new project that we have with NORAD, about which you will be hearing very soon. This project will revolutionize the functioning of our CoPs.
Contribution to knowledge generation and dissemination
All these efforts are geared towards a specific goal: to encourage and promote the sharing of knowledge for more effective and evidence-based health policies. In 2014, the CoPs contributed in generating and disseminating key knowledge agendas.
At the beginning of the year, the WHO Bulletin published an editorial on the key results of our regional conference on district health systems in Africa. This gesture was a good recognition of the synthesis visionary report that was a produced as a result of this event. However, we were frustrated by the fact that the partner who had promised to share the report of this conference with all ministries of health, did not fulfill their promise. We remain convinced, however, that our open approach to knowledge exchange and sharing, promoted with passion yet determination, will end up bearing fruit.
We are also proud to have successfully organized in Bujumbura the first African conference on health information technology and communication and health financing. More than 60 experts present at this conference were able to have in depth reflections and discussions on this subject, which will certainly transform the health systems of countries in the coming decades. We also see a great potential of collaborating with start-ups interested in strengthening the digital facet of health systems.
We have already mentioned above the Muskoka report on health financing fragmentation in Francophone Africa. We hope this report that emphasizes the extent of the problem, will place it squarely on the agenda of policy makers and researchers.
What a full year 2014 was!. All of this was possible thanks to your many and diverse contributions, your presence at a workshop or meeting, your ideas during a brainstorming session, your blog (or your comments on a blog), your thoughts on the online discussion forums…..We are proud of these collaborative achievements, and together, we can be more ambitious for the coming year. We shall be talking about this very soon, but in the meantime, we wish you all a happy new year 2015, full of achievements and in good health.
The year 2014 is coming to an end. To draw key lessons from the various activities undertaken during the past 12 months, the facilitators of the CoPs under the auspices of the International Partnership “Harmonization for Health in Africa”, met for two days in Rabat, at the National School of Public Health. In this blog post, we review the achievements and shortcoming of the CoPs during the year 2014.
The CoPs
The number of CoPs affiliated to HHA continues to grow. You are probably already familiar with the CoPs “Financial Access to Health Services”, “E-med” (in French only), “Performance Based Financing”, “Health Systems Planning & Budgeting” and “Health Service Delivery”. In Rabat, we became aware of the programmes and priorities of two new CoPs: one focused on “Human Resources for Maternal, Neonatal and Child Health” (in French only) and the other on Quality of Care in Referral Hospitals in Africa (in French only). Our meeting in Rabat was also an opportunity, to review the joint activities undertaken by many of our CoPs during the year. Our first experiences with joint inter-CoP/collaborative activities encourages us to believe that this is the road to take in the future. We also need to stay focused on strengthening the facilitation team. A step towards this was taken in 2014 and we hope to accelerate this progress in 2015.
Face-to-Face Events
In 2013, we organized two regional conferences (Dakar & Ouagadougou) and two international workshops (Bergen & Antwerp). While all these face-to-face events were judged a success, they left several members of the facilitation teams feeling drained and tired. The lesson learned was that, as valuable and enriching as they are, we had to be more modest in the future with regard to face-to-face events.
Hence, in 2014, we only organized one major event: the « ICT 4 RBF : When technological innovation meets health care financing innovation » meeting (28/4-1/5 Bujumbura). However, in an attempt to continue to foster face-to-face meetings among CoP members, we took advantage of major events organized by others. This is was particularly the case with the AfHEA conference in Nairobi, where we had a stand, and the regional conference in Dakar on budget analysis and advocacy for health, which we co-organized.
We were also present at the third global symposium on health systems research in Cape Town, where we had our own satellite session, co-organized another satellite session and had a stand, which was visited by a large number of participants. Last but not the least, the year came to a close with 2 meetings in Rabat: one gathering the facilitators of the various CoPs and the other to launch the second phase of the collaborative Muskoka project on health financing.
Collaborative Projects: The Muskoka Study
We had hoped for 2014 to be a year of consolidating the added value of CoPs, and a year when we wrapped up ongoing projects. For the Financial Access to Health Services and Performance Based Financing CoPs, the priority was the “Muskoka” project. This project was deemed strategic, as it mobilized experts from both CoPs: If we were able to successfully undertake such a collaborative research project in such a large number of countries (12), we could affirm our capacity to develop an original niche in global health, that of collaborative comparative research among countries.
The Muskoka study produced the results we were hoping for and provided important evidence about one of the main challenges facing implementing universal health coverage in Francophone Africa: that of the serious level of fragmentation of various health financing schemes at the country level. These results were disseminated widely at both the national and international levels.
The interest in this collaborative study and the growing attention accorded to our CoPs, has made us realize that an informal relationship based on mutual trust and confidence is being developed with various Ministries of Health. In a call to participate in Phase 2 of the Muskoka study, 11 countries sent a formal letter of request to participate in the study, signed either by the Ministers of Health themselves or the Secretaries Generals of the Ministries of Health.
Online forums
We must admit that the focus put on the Muskoka research study probably had a negative impact on some of our other activities. Indeed, if our online discussion forums remain an essential and integral activity to keep expert-members aware of recent technical developments in their field of interest, some of our forums have unfortunately been less dynamic this year as compared to previous years. We are aware that some of our forums are underutilized today. It is difficult for us to assess the impact or importance of the information that is being shared, and we are not very satisfied with the way in which we organize our discussions and debates in two languages. For some CoPs, the main challenge has been the limited availability of facilitators. We hope to address this problem in 2015, but to us it is clear that the dynamism of our online discussion forums will continue to rely on your individual and collective contributions.
Many CoPs prepare regular newsletters and statistics have confirmed that these, are widely read. However, some of these CoPs, will have to find a way to progressively encourage their audience to become more interactive. In Rabat, we further discussed our collaborative project of organizing inter-CoP webinars.
Blogs
Blogs are an important resource for our CoPs. They enable us to share in-depth analysis on a particular topic, showcase the important research and field work of our members, and enable us to share and discuss with other key experts beyond our members. It is important for us to remember, however, that one of the main objectives of these blogs is to showcase our expert-members. Did you know that one of our experts from Central Africa was contacted by three organizations after publishing his highly viewed blog?
The health financing CoPs continue to invest in their “Health Financing in Africa blog” depending on the urgencies at hand and on the availability of an overly busy editorial team. The blog performancebasedfinancing.org is often used during events organized by the CoP PBF itself. The blog santemondiale.org promotes the Politiques Internationales de Santé newsletter (in French) and the blog health4africa.net, focuses on publishing the work of the CoP-Health Service Delivery. We realize that managing all these blogs is a heavy and demanding task, which is why we will likely try to consolidate these activities in 2015.
Mobilizing funds
One of the key activities of the facilitation team is to mobilize sufficient funding for the various activities of the CoPs. In 2014, our long-term partners, notably UNICEF & the French Muskoka Fund, renewed their structural support to the CoPs. Other partners continue to provide support for specific activities, for example the World Bank supported the Bujumbura workshop and Cordaid supported the Muskoka study. We have also made new partnerships. The Belgian cooperation will be financing some of our activities for the period 2014-2016 and we are particularly happy about a new collaboration with the WHO P4H network, who supported our launch workshop for Phase 2 of the Muskoka study in Rabat. But perhaps we are most hopeful about an exciting new project that we have with NORAD, about which you will be hearing very soon. This project will revolutionize the functioning of our CoPs.
Contribution to knowledge generation and dissemination
All these efforts are geared towards a specific goal: to encourage and promote the sharing of knowledge for more effective and evidence-based health policies. In 2014, the CoPs contributed in generating and disseminating key knowledge agendas.
At the beginning of the year, the WHO Bulletin published an editorial on the key results of our regional conference on district health systems in Africa. This gesture was a good recognition of the synthesis visionary report that was a produced as a result of this event. However, we were frustrated by the fact that the partner who had promised to share the report of this conference with all ministries of health, did not fulfill their promise. We remain convinced, however, that our open approach to knowledge exchange and sharing, promoted with passion yet determination, will end up bearing fruit.
We are also proud to have successfully organized in Bujumbura the first African conference on health information technology and communication and health financing. More than 60 experts present at this conference were able to have in depth reflections and discussions on this subject, which will certainly transform the health systems of countries in the coming decades. We also see a great potential of collaborating with start-ups interested in strengthening the digital facet of health systems.
We have already mentioned above the Muskoka report on health financing fragmentation in Francophone Africa. We hope this report that emphasizes the extent of the problem, will place it squarely on the agenda of policy makers and researchers.
What a full year 2014 was!. All of this was possible thanks to your many and diverse contributions, your presence at a workshop or meeting, your ideas during a brainstorming session, your blog (or your comments on a blog), your thoughts on the online discussion forums…..We are proud of these collaborative achievements, and together, we can be more ambitious for the coming year. We shall be talking about this very soon, but in the meantime, we wish you all a happy new year 2015, full of achievements and in good health.
