Sub-Saharan Africa

Developing a Tool to Measure Satisfaction among Health Professionals in Sub-Saharan Africa

Measurement of health workers’ satisfaction adapted to sub-Saharan African working conditions and cultures is a challenge. The objective of this study was to develop a valid and reliable instrument to measure satisfaction among health professionals in the sub-Saharan African context. [from abstract]

Hotline HRH June 2013

This edition of Hotline, an HRH newletter focused on the needs of faith-based organizations (FBOs) in Africa, highlights resources, trainings and workshops, articles of interest and other information for FBO HRH pracitioners.

Stemming the Impact of Health Professional Brain Drain from Africa: A Systemic Review of Policy Options

Several studies have suggested policy options to reduce brain drain from Africa. The purpose of this paper is to review possible policies which can stem the impact of health professional brain drain from Africa. [from abstract]

Nursing and Midwifery Regulatory Reform in East, Central and Southern Africa: A Survey of Key Stakeholders

Enacting appropriate changes in both regulation and education of nurses requires engagement of national regulatory bodies, and key stakeholders such as government chief nursing officers, professional associations, and educators. The purpose of this research is to describe the perspectives and engagement of these stakeholders in advancing critical regulatory and educational reform in east, central, and southern Africa. [adapted from abstract]

Exploring Contraceptive Use Differentials in Sub-Saharan Africa through a Health Workforce Lens

This technical brief presents findings from a study that explored if and how health workforce measures differ between eastern and western Africa, in an effort to identify factors that may have helped some countries to achieve important gains in contraceptive prevalence while other countries have not.

Home- or Community-Based Programmes for Treating Malaria: Review

This review evaluated the effects of a home- or community-based program for treating malaria in a malaria endemic setting through interventions involving training community health workers or mothers. [adapted from author]

Deployment of Community Health Workers across Rural Sub-Saharan Africa: Financial Considerations and Operational Assumptions

This paper provides cost guidance for one adaptable configuration of a community health worker subsystem: a provider system housed within a larger primary-health-care system that includes clinics and referral hospitals. Costing is done by function and by local epidemiologic characteristics so that components and assumptions can be easily modified. [adapted from introduction]

Hotline HRH May 2013

This edition of Hotline, an HRH newletter focused on the needs of faith-based organizations (FBOs) in Africa, highlights resources, trainings and workshops, articles of interest and other information for FBO HRH pracitioners.

Hotline HRH April 2013

This edition of Hotline, an HRH newletter focused on the needs of faith-based organizations (FBOs) in Africa, highlights resources, trainings and workshops, articles of interest and other information for FBO HRH pracitioners.

Hotline HRH March 2013

This edition of Hotline, an HRH newletter focused on the needs of faith-based organizations (FBOs) in Africa, highlights resources, trainings and workshops, articles of interest and other information for FBO HRH pracitioners.

Hotline HRH February 2013

This edition of Hotline, an HRH newletter focused on the needs of faith-based organizations (FBOs) in Africa, highlights resources, trainings and workshops, articles of interest and other information for FBO HRH pracitioners.

Voluntary Medical Male Circumcision: Strategies for Meeting the Human Resource Needs of Scale-Up in Southern and Eastern Africa

This study looked at previous literature and conducted a program review to identify approaches that address human resource constraints that would enable scale up of voluntary medical male circumcision for reduction of female-to-male HIV transmission for public health impact. [adapted from abstract]

Human Capacity Within Child Welfare Systems: The Social Work Workforce in Africa

The intent of this study is to inform stakeholders about the opportunities for and constraints on building the social work workforce within the child welfare sector in Africa through an analysis of Africa-specific program descriptions and evaluations; government policies, laws, and strategic plans; and statistical data on the child welfare and social welfare workforce. [from summary]

South African University Practitioner Partnership to Strengthen Capacity in Social and Behaviour Change Communication

The following case study describes and reflects on a partnership between a southern university, the University of the Witwatersrand, and Soul City Institute to establish an academic, competency-based social and behaviour change program serving Southern Africa. [from author]

Systematic Review Evaluating the Impact of Task Shifting on Access to Antiretroviral Therapy in Sub-Saharan Africa

This review evaluates whether task shifting of ART initiation and management from physicians to nurses increases access to antiretroviral therapy, the primary purpose cited for the implementation of task shifting policies. [from introduction]

Labor Market for Health Workers in Africa: A New Look at the Crisis

This book sheds light on the status of health worker need, supply, and distribution across Africa. It analyzes regional and country data to address six key issues: the specific levels of human resources for health in Africa; differences in human resources for health across countries; changing roles of the public and private sector in the healthworker market; motivation for health worker performance; health worker training; and producing health workers. [adapted from author]

Analysis of Human Resources for Health in African Portuguese Speaking Countries (PALOP)

The report provides available data on the health workforce in PALOP. Its purpose is to support the responsible staff and partners to identify the needs for intervention, in order to improve the national and regional capacity for the development of human resources for health. [from summary]

Because Health Workers Matter: They Need Our Support

This advocacy document details the contributions of African Christian Health Associations in addressing health worker shortage including: developing and implementing sound HRH management policies, investing in human resources information systems, addressing health worker attraction and retention, and monitoring & evaluating progress and results of faith based-organizations’ HRH intiatives. [adapted from author]

Hotline HRH January 2013

This edition of Hotline, an HRH newletter focused on the needs of faith-based organizations (FBOs) in Africa, highlights resources, trainings and workshops, articles of interest and other information for FBO HRH pracitioners.

Hotline HRH November 2012

This edition of Hotline, an HRH newletter focused on the needs of faith-based organizations (FBOs) in Africa, highlights resources, trainings and workshops, articles of interest and other information for FBO HRH pracitioners.

Guidance on Using Needs Based Formulae and Gap Analysis in the Equitable Allocation of Health Care Resources in East and Southern Africa

This paper proposes that the needs-based formula be used to identify the provinces and districts that are furthest from their health equity targets and that they should receive priority for the allocation of additional budgetary resources. A detailed gap analysis focuses on comparing the current health human resources in each of these provinces and districts to national norms. [adapted from author]

Finding, Organizing and Using Health Information: A Training Manual for Students, Researchers and Health Workers in Africa

Whether you are a doctor, a nurse, an allied health professional or a medical librarian, this manual provides answers to the most crucial questions that arise while searching for health information. The manual covers topics such as: available information sources, tools and techniques for searching the web, intellectual property rights, managing and storing information, and evaluating information for accuracy. The resource also includes video guides for each module.[adapted from author]

Hotline HRH October 2012

This edition of Hotline, an HRH newletter focused on the needs of faith-based organizations (FBOs) in Africa, highlights resources, trainings and workshops, articles of interest and other information for FBO HRH pracitioners.

Technical Efficiency of Human Resources for Health in Africa

The objectives of the study reported in this article were to: estimate the technical and scale efficiency of national health systems (NHS) in utilizing human resources for health in African continent to produce various ultimate health outputs; identify the magnitudes of inefficiencies in the use of human resources for health in individual countries; identify the best performer NHS whose practice could be emulated by others; and highlight the implications for policy to health sector policy-makers. [from author]

Human Resources for Health in Africa: Experiences, Challenges and Realities

This report contains the proceedings of a meeting of 18 francophone and Spanish-speaking countries in Africa focusing on the HRH crisis. It outlines common challenges faced by the countries concerned and provides suggestions on the role of regional entities and development partners. [from publisher]

Africa's Neglected Area of Human Resources for Health Research: The Way Forward

Reviewing the status of human resources for health research (HRHR) in Africa, the authors assert that it consists of uncoordinated, small-scale activities, primarily driven from outside Africa. This article also presents examples of ongoing HRHR capacity building initiatives in Africa and a simple model to help countries plan and strategise a comprehensive approach to research capacity strengthening. [adapted from abstract]

Human Resources for Health Research (HRHR) Perspectives

This presentation outlines the need for and way forward to building human resources for health research capacity for system strengthening in Africa.

Human Resources Crisis in Southern Countries: A Major Obstacle to the Fight Against HIV

Conseil national du sida wished to delve further into the human resources crisis in Southern countries. It therefore sought to identify the main causes and determining factors behind the said crisis and to put forth various strategies in an attempt to turn that trend around. [from author]

De Plus en Plus de Malades et de Moins en Moins de Soignants: La Crise des Ressources Humaines du Secteur de la Santé en Afrique

The lack of human resources in the health sector in developing countries is not new. The shortage became a crisis few years after the Millenium Declaration as countries found it difficult to meet the Millennium Development Goals owing to the shortage of health workers.­ The causes of the shortage are multiple and complex, involving management, training and staff distribution issues, as well as migration of workers from the public sector to the private sector, from rural areas to the cities and from one country to another. [from abstract]

HIV Self-Testing among Health Workers: A Review of the Literature and Discussion of Current Practices, Issues and Options for Increasing Access to HIV Testing in Sub-Saharan Africa

This paper examines the particular issues of self-testing for HIV among health workers in sub-Saharan Africa, where high levels of interest and motivation for self-testing among health workers has been reported and informal self-testing already practiced. [from summary]