“Towards a scaling-up of training and education for health workers”
Isabel CF da Cruz
Joint call for papers
for special issue of the journals:
þ Online Brazilian Journal of
Nursing ( www.uff.br/objnursing
)
þ Education for Health (www.educationforhealth.net)
þ Human Resources for Health (www.human-resources-health.com)
World Health Organization and the journals Online
Brazilian Journal of Nursing, Education
for Health, and Human Resources for Health are now accepting papers
for joint special issues addressing the critical need for a skilled,
sustainable health workforce in the developing world. Submitted articles must
fall under the broad theme:
“Towards a scaling-up of
training and education for health workers”
The World Health Report 2006, Working together for health, recognized the
centrality of the health workforce for the effective operation of country
health systems and outlined proposals to tackle a global shortage of 4.3
million health workers. There is increasing evidence that that this shortage is
interfering with efforts to achieve international development goals, including
those contained in the Millenium Declaration and
those of WHO’s priority programmes.
The health workforce crisis
in developing countries derives principally from inadequate educational
opportunities for health workers and a lack of relevance of their training to
community health care practice. Additional contributing factors include:
inadequate compensation and working conditions, the deteriorating health of the
workforce in many developing countries, urban/rural and workforce imbalance,
and migration of the workforce from developing to developed countries.
We are seeking manuscripts which
concern the scaling-up of training and education for health workers. Possible
sub-themes include, but are not limited to:
þ private sector
engagement
þ regulatory frameworks for
education and practice
þ labour market dynamics after the
production of health workers (e.g. retention)
þ training teams rather
than individuals
þ skills mix
þ multi-skilled workers,
responsive to exiting needs
þ task-shifting
/ role substitution
þ competency-based
education and training
Examples of questions that could
be considered are:
· What ongoing efforts
to increase graduate level primary care training have been established in
developing countries. What has been their impact and what have been their
problemss
· What effective
strategies have been developed and tested for customizing the workforce skill
mix to local health service needss For example, what impact have recent health
sector reforms had on the local health workforces
· What is the status of
existing efforts to train health workers using innovative methods, including
distance learning and various forms of information technologys How will training by
protocol differ from, and complement, traditional community health worker
trainings
· How can the health professional training be better aligned with local
health needs and be more socially accountable?v
· What is the status of
existing collaborations between developing countries aiming to improve health
worker educations
· How have modifications
in healthcare management had an impact upon health workforce capacity at the
local levels
Papers will be accepted in
two formats:
Full papers of 3000 words or less
for policy and research papers
Brief communications of less than
1200 words: better suited to program or project descriptions or commentaries.
Planned publication is over the
period from June to August 2008. There will be an online facility to respond to
published articles in order to accommodate a live debate.
If you would like to
submit either an article or brief, please send us a provisional
title and a short outline of the major topics you would address.
Proposals for manuscripts are due
by 31 July 2007 and should be submitted by e-mail to hrhspecial@who.int. Instructions for
submission of articles will then be provided with feedback. Final manuscripts
are due by 30 October 2007.
þ
Note: OBJN
proposals for manuscripts are due by February 28th, 2008