-To Improve Healthcare Delivery
By: Emmanuel Weedee-Conway
Following nine months of intensive study, a total of 17 health workers and administrators have graduated from the first batch of the USAID funded BRIDGE-U Evidence Based Health Policy program.
The program, which is being implemented by the state-run University of Liberia College of Health Sciences (ULCHS), aims to help health workers and policy makers to make decisions based on evidence and to address current health challenges and future needs.
Giving the overview of the program, Madam Neiman Nora Candy, Bridge-U Deputy Director for Certificate Course said, during the nine months training, the graduates learned the importance of evidence and how it can be used to improve health policies.
“They also provide constructive, thoughtful peer review to colleagues on understanding and utilizing evidence to make inform decisions in health. The graduates can proactively identify opportunities for improving health policy using new evidence,” she stated.
According to her, during the training, the graduates had the opportunity to discuss and analyze approaches for decision making in the absence of robust, high-quality evidence.
Madam Candy explained that the training gave graduates the chance to hold discussions and utilize evidence to enable in-country ownership of decision-making processes.
In remarks, USAID Health Program Management Specialist Pamela Bernard-Sawyer told the graduates that their role as evidence-based health participants is crucial to transforming research into practice.
Madam Bernard-Sawyer indicated that it is expected that their expertise and skills over the last nine months will yield the desired results in the health sector through positive impacts and changes in the health sector.
Also speaking, Dr. Catherine Thomas Cooper, Deputy of Minister Health and Chief Medical Officer lauded UL Medical School for developing the evidence based course.
Dr. Cooper said the nine month course will help the graduates to use evidence to address health challenges and make decisions in the health sector.
She added that it is about time that Liberia uses its own expertise in developing policies on evidence based data.
“We stand prepared that we are now set to use the evidence to inform our decision based on policies,” she noted.
Deputy Minister Cooper narrated that most of the policies currently in place are all recommendations from WHO, some of which are lagging behind.
“We need to re-look our policies and redirect our vision to what can really work in Liberia so that we are closer to the attainment of universal health coverage,” Dr. Cooper concluded.
At the same time, two of graduates have described the nine-month program as rewarding and benefiting to the nation and its people.
“It was rewarding. It has brought a new direction that we can rely on for data and see what’s working and make good decision,” stated Madam Siatta L.A. Gray of the National Public Health Institute of Liberia (NPHIL).
“It was interesting. It provides an opportunity to put policy into practice. We can generate all the evidence to help the ARREST Agenda as a government. I am excited and want to thank the College of Health Sciences for developing new dimension in the health sector. We are looking at ways for sustainable solutions for the future,” asserted Mr. George Jacobs, Assistant Minister for Planning and Policy at the Ministry of Health.
