The Department of Community Health of Mbarara University of Science and Technology (MUST) has registered success stories in strengthening health care service delivery to the communities in Southwestern Uganda. This has been achieved through the collaboration with Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston Massachusetts in the USA.
In 2018, MUST through the Department of Community Health, Faculty of Medicine, started implementing First Mile Community Health Program aimed at establishing MUST as a premier academic medical center focused on community-based health care delivery, research, and innovation.
The First Mile takes MUST to the community and brings the community to MUST for capacity building. The community is brought to MUST through quarterly CME training for community health providers by MUST faculty, one week of clinical attachment of community health providers to MUST/Mbarara Regional Referral Hospital (MRRH), and through organizing platforms for disseminating best practices and knowledge like community health conference. The program takes MUST to the community through field attachments of postgraduate trainees (PGs) for experiential learning, supporting community health-focused research grants.
In May 2022, the program received funding for another period of implementation to build on initial implementation phase that was between 2018 to 2020. Earlier today, the program held its re-orientation and planning meeting with health facility leaders to launch the second period of implementation.
According to the program coordinator, Dr. Peter Kawungezi, the purpose of this program is to strengthen health service delivery to the people within their first mile of accessing health care hence the nomenclature of the ‘First Mile Community Health program’.
Associate Prof Edgar Mulogo, the program director, commended the work done by the team members towards strengthening health care services in the community and thanked the MUST administration and other partners for the support they render towards the program.
‘’In this re-orientation meeting, we have invited managers of health facilities to have an opportunity of hearing from them and obtain facts about the areas where they need support from MUST. Several areas have been highlighted with regard to what they want. These included continuing medical education, mentorship from the faculty at MUST, and innovations to strengthen health service delivery. We now have a clear idea on how we can support them as MUST and also contribute to service delivery to address pertinent health challenges with the communities they serve,’’ Prof Mulogo elaborated.
‘’We are grateful that Massachusetts General Hospital and MUST are working together in order to ensure that the health service delivery of communities and populations within the MUST catchment area is strengthened,’’ he concluded.
The project’s first implementation phase was completed successfully with achievements in mentoring and equipping health community based health providers with new knowledge, skills and up to date techniques in prioritiszed areas of Basic and emergency obstetric care, emergence triage and treatment of sick children (ETAT+), infection prevention and control, leadership and management, data utilization, and onsite mentorship in specialized clinic services (ophthalmology, dermatology) and use of medical equipment like the ultrasound machine.
Further, the program plans to build the capacity of community health providers to showcase the best practices and knowledge in community health. This will be achieved through scientific writing workshops and providing support to present at local, national, and regional conferences focused on community health.
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