Strengthening privately run pre-service health training institutions for enhanced enrolment and quality of health workers

Sector

Health

Project budget

The maximum budget for this project is € 2 million.

Organisations

This project outline has been formulated by the Christian Social Service Commission (CSSC). The tender for this project expired on 11 January 2010. The tender for this project expired on 11 January 2010.

Nuffic has awarded this tender to ETC Foundation, which has formed a consortium with Hanzehogeschool Groningen and the University of Groningen. The preferred suppliers are Tanzanian Training Centre for International Health (TTCIH), Ifakara Health Institute (IHI), Human Development Trust (HDT) and Community Health Promotion Kenya (CHPK) in conjunction with Kenya Medical Training College (KMTC).

Project description

Tanzania currently has a health staff shortage of 65% in the public sector and 86% in the private sector. This is more pronounced in rural and hardship areas and among mid-level workers such as clinicians, nurses, midwives, laboratory staff, pharmaceutical technicians, health officers and administrators.

The limited capacity of many privately run Health Training Institutions (HTIs) to manage their facilities efficiently, effectively and in a transparent manner, is an obstacle for HTIs to promote their trainings and attract new funding and students. Their capacity to offer quality trainings is equally limited.

Existing staff lack teaching capacities (lecturing tutors and medical doctors who never had any teaching methodology courses) and there are not enough tutors to serve all HTIs sufficiently, to train an increased number of students and to guarantee good quality training.

In addition, related infrastructural capacities are insufficient to offer an acceptable quality standard to tutors and students for a conducive and gender- sensitive learning atmosphere. In the past, health trainings were not appropriately linked to the labour market and exit qualifications of HTI graduates were not harmonized for NACTE accreditation.

This NICHE project will directly enhance the supply and quality of health workers for improved access to quality healthcare. It will contribute to strengthening the human capital and institutional capacities (including selected infrastructural capacities) of privately run pre-service health training institutions in Tanzania to increase enrolment and to make trainings competence-based, labour market oriented and gender sensitive.

The project is looking into building up the CSSC capacity in a phased approach in order to enable CSSC to strengthen the privately run HTIs' capacity to develop and implement quality training programmes at a larger scale, to attract students and to improve rural health services.