Achieving sustainable results: 80 health officials trained on capacity building

Health secretary feels training will strengthen the system

KARACHI: As many as 60 serving health managers from all the districts of Sindh and 20 provincial mid-level managers from the Sindh secretariat and the Sindh health services director-general’s office have been trained through a work-study programme over the past two years, with 58 of them receiving their certificates on Saturday.

The programme ensured a continuous inflow of capacity building instead of waiting for long periods of time for officers to complete training and re-join, said an associate professor and director of graduate programmes at community health sciences at Aga Khan University Hospital (AKUH), Dr Shehla Zaidi. She was speaking at a ceremony organised to recognise the efforts of all the trained officers of the health department at AKUH on Saturday morning. The training, an initiative of the Sindh health department undertaken in collaboration with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), was imparted by the AKUH.

Health secretary Ahmed Bukhsh Narejo highlighted his priorities by stressing the need to strengthen the human resources for health. “I am of the firm belief that capacity building of the human resources for health is the most sustainable investment to strengthen the system, organisation and individuals,” he said. Narejo added that all such initiatives being carried out by the Sindh government are part of capacity building of its workforce and health managers.

Besides the 80 officials, 10 provincial health managers enrolled in the two-year Master’s of Science programme in Health Policy and Management at AKUH were also present. They remarked that they have already started implementing what they have been studying in their two years’ course such as monitoring, evaluations and strategy formation.

The mid- and senior-level managers did standalone courses in Monitoring and Evaluation, Quality Management, Health Sector Reforms, Human Resource Management and Planning and Budgeting.

According to the health secretary, the department takes full ownership of such initiatives and is planning to carry them forward.

AKUH faculty member Dr Rashid Juma awarded certificates to the 58 graduating managers.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 5^th, 2016.