WHO COVID-19 Health Services Learning Hub – Call for Innovative Practices

The World Health Organization (WHO) is developing the COVID-19: Health Services Learning Hub (HLH) in response to the urgent demand from member states for technical support in maintaining essential health services during the COVID-19 pandemic response.

The World Health Organization (WHO) is developing the COVID-19: Health Services Learning Hub (HLH) in response to the urgent demand from member states for technical support in maintaining essential health services during the COVID-19 pandemic response. The COVID-19: Health Services Learning Hub (HLH), will support implementation of WHO’s Operational guidance for maintaining essential health services (EHS) during an outbreak, which provides a set of targeted actions that countries should consider at national, regional, and local levels to reorganise and maintain access to essential quality health services for all. Further information on the HLH is outlined in the concept note.

The WHO are now looking for your assistance to help identify, capture and share examples of innovative practices being adopted across the world to reorganise and deliver essential health services in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. These practices may have been adopted at a national, regional or local level (health facility level e.g. hospital group or individual hospital / clinic) in your country. The WHO wish to capture these practices in the form of action briefs. If you have been involved in delivering essential health services during the COVID-19 pandemic in your country and you have an innovative practice or example to share about how you did this then we would encourage you to submit this as part of this data collection exercise. To see what information is being requested please see the HLH Action Brief. You can submit your practice using the following online survey.

If you have not been directly involved in such work but you know people who have been and who could provide such information on the practice we would encourage you to share this call with them and to encourage them to participate.

The action briefs are intended to be succinct with a focus on practical solutions and specific problems. The focus for now is on capturing as many innovative practices as possible so it does not have to be a final or polished product at this time and so your description can be shorter than the word limit of 500 words and bullet points are also acceptable. The WHO also encourage the use of video or multimedia to explain or supplement your practice (see example of this approach here). Videos or multimedia content may be sent directly to Dr Ghazanfar Khan Lead, COVID-19: Health Services Learning Hub at [email protected]. Please ensure that you mention in your email the action brief that the video or multimedia relates to and please also reference it in the online questionnaire.

As outlined in the concept note, the plan is that practices, solutions and ideas captured through the country briefs will then be explored and discussed in more detail through the learning laboratories. The learning laboratories are essentially dynamic communities of practice that will focus on sharing approaches and common strategies to health service challenges in the context of COVID-19. Facilitated learning labs on key thematic areas (i.e. digital innovation) will aid such discussions and help to challenge each other and spark innovation between countries.

Please share this call with anyone in your network who you think might have innovative practices that they could share.

Thank you for your support of this important initiative.

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Nourhan Kawtharani

Nourhan, a quality and safety coordinator with eight years of experience in ambulatory healthcare in Lebanon, aims to deepen her understanding of the systemic and holistic approach to healthcare through this fellowship.

She aims to identify gaps and develop tailored interventions that address specific contexts rather than applying general solutions. Engaging with diverse professionals and perspectives during this educational journey will expand the application of these concepts across different cultural settings.

Nourhan emphasizes the importance of promoting a culture of continuous learning and improvement within healthcare institutions, considering it a vital leadership responsibility to integrate quality and safety initiatives into the organizational culture.

Nourhan's commitment to patient safety and quality management includes sourcing practical resources and transforming insights into actionable knowledge to drive continued progress in healthcare practices and outcomes.

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Elom Otchi

Elom is passionate about improving quality of care and patient safety outcomes.

In view of this, he has had the opportunity to work in various capacities with various organisations including AfIHQSA, WHO, UNICEF and others undertaking research, supporting the development of national quality policies and strategies, facilitating the establishment of quality governance systems across all the levels of the health sector and building capacity of national and sub-national quality leads/teams to institutionalize the practice of quality and patient safety across the continent.

He has also worked extensively across all levels of care in the health sector of Ghana, including leading the Quality & Patient Safety program in its largest teaching hospital.

I would like to use this Fellowship as a learning platform and an opportunity to acquire the requisite knowledge, skills and competencies to complement ongoing efforts by like-minded individuals and organizations to continuously advance improve the quality and patient safety in Ghana and the continent.

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Stephen Taiye Balogun

Stephen is a Senior Programme Officer at the Institute of Human Virology in Nigeria as well as Country Representative for Health Information for All (HIFA).

Stephen plans to use this opportunity to maximise his impact by championing the cause of patient safety and quality in Nigeria and across Africa.

Stephen says "Quality and safety is a major wheel through which universal healthcare coverage can be achieved. The goal is to be a bridge in the gap between the International Quality Improvement and Patient Safety community and my country to ensure rapid spread, adoption, implementation and practice."

We are looking forward to working with both Stephen and our 2020 winner Rhoda Kalondu over the next year.

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Dr Rhoda Kalondu

Rhoda is the Head of the Patient Safety Unit at Kenyatta Hospital in Nairobi and wants to use this Fellowship to learn how to establish a culture of safety and develop systems for assessment and analysis at her institution, and more widely. As well as this, Rhoda intends to develop and execute an intervention to improve patient safety in Kenyatta National Hospital.

It is one thing to institute measures and processes for improvement, but quite another to change the culture of an environment. Rhoda's ambition to lead others in this change inspired the panel.

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Dr Subhrojyoti Bhowmick

I am an MBBS graduate from Calcutta University with a Gold Medal in Gynecology & Obstetrics.

I have completed M.D in Pharmacology from IPGME& R, Kolkata and have over 12 years of experience in the field of Clinical Research, Pharmacovigilance and Medication management in Hospitals.

I have completed certification in Clinical Research Administration & Project Management from Stanford University, USA and in Patient Safety from Johns Hopkins University, USA.

I am an Assessor for National Accreditation Board for Hospitals & Health care providers (NABH), India assessing hospitals for medication safety and clinical quality standards and NABH Assessor for Ethics Committee Accreditation program in India as well.

I serve as the Chairperson, Institutional Ethics Committee of Health Point Hospital, Kolkata and am associated with 2 other Hospital ethics committees as a member.

I finished my Fellowship in Healthcare Quality from the International Society of Quality in Healthcare (ISQua) from Ireland in 2017.

I have published several research articles and have also authored a chapter on “Regulations governing Clinical Trial” in the book “Fundamentals of Clinical Trial & Research”.

I am a peer reviewer for prestigious international journals like the British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology, CNS Drugs and Drug Safety case reports.

I am the recipient of the UK Seth Oration Award for Best Clinical Pharmacology paper by the Indian Pharmacological Society in 2009 and the “Most promising Healthcare professional in Patient Safety in India” award by the Asian African Chamber of Commerce and Industry in October 2018.

Recently in April 2019, I received the Young Quality Achiever award by Consortium of Accredited Healthcare Organizations (CAHO), India for 2019 for my work in the field of medication safety and clinical research.

I have a keen interest in teaching and am visiting adjunct faculty of Pharmacology at KMC, Mangalore, India and for Healthcare technology at MAKAUT, Kolkata, India.

I was associated with Stanford University School of Medicine, in the USA as a Senior Clinical Research Associate from 2015 to 2017 and have certification in Biostatistics, Evidence-based Medicine and Medical Writing from Stanford University.

Currently, I am working as the Clinical Director of Academics, Medical Quality and Clinical Research at Peerless Hospital and B K Roy Research Centre, Kolkata.

I am very happy and thrilled to receive the prestigious ISQua Lucian Leape Patient safety Fellowship Award for 2019 and I look forward to honing my skills further in the field of healthcare quality and patient safety through my experiences during this fellowship.

I sincerely believe that successful completion of this fellowship will help me evolve as a more confident Patient safety leader in India who in turn can provide significant inputs on policy changes through NABH for the Indian healthcare system.

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