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Meeting tomorrow's health challenges through workforce excellence in supply chain management
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It has been a busy time for the PtD Secretariat and we have some updates for you.
- New vision and mission statements: At the PtD Board meeting in June, new vision and mission statements were formulated and approved, including new strategic goals. We are excited to share these with you.
- Health and Humanitarian Logistics Conference: PtD was present at the Health and Humanitarian Logistics Conference in Atlanta, Georgia. The conference provided an open forum to discuss the challenges and new solutions in disaster preparedness and response, long-term development and humanitarian aid, and global health delivery. PtD hosted two workshops, 1) PTD's country-based approach which highlighted the Namibia experience and 2) a joint workshop with IAPHL and HLA on professional associations. We share with you Namibia's story.
- Country Partnership Program: PtD is launching a new program to support Ministries of Health, NGOs and implementing partners to plan, implement, and sustain reforms which strengthen human resources for the health supply chain management. PtD acts as a “broker of services” whereby it matches country needs with funding and/or PtD members who can supply the service. We share with you more information on this program.
- PtD website: the new People that Deliver website will launch this fall. Please check for a communication on this.
- Staffing: Stefanie Dannemann Purnat will be leaving us at the end of October. As the Information and Data Officer responsible for our communications strategy she is a self-described "knowledge seeker and communication enthusiast" who always tries to facilitate a culture of knowledge sharing within organizations, groups and individuals. We will be advertising for her replacement soon.
Do you have a compelling supply chain story which you would like to share with the broader PtD community? Send your suggestions to [email protected].
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Namibia's Integrated Actions to Improve the Health Supply Chain Management Workforce
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© Photo by Trevor Snapp / courtesy of IntraHealth International. “Grace” takes her ARVs in Omalegefo, Namibia, June 2011.
In November 2013, the Minister of Health of Namibia presented a formal request to the PtD Board and member organizations for technical support to develop a sustainable strategy to improve access to health commodities. Led by the government of Namibia and supported by expertise from PtD and its members—notably the USAID- and PEPFAR-funded Supply Chain Management System (SCMS) project and CapacityPlus—the PtD-Namibia collaboration sought to understand and improve Namibia’s public sector health supply chain management (SCM) workforce, focusing on the MOHSS’s immediate priority: staff at the central medical store (CMS) and regional medical depots (RMDs).
See the synthesis report here.
Activity 1: Competency mapping of central and regional supply chain staff
The purpose of the competency mapping activity was to identify sets of core knowledge, skills, and attitudes (i.e., competencies) needed among different cadres of supply chain workers to guide the development or revision of, among other things, education and training curricula, scopes of practice, job descriptions, and performance frameworks.
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Activity 2: Estimating staffing needs at the central medical store and regional medical depots
To gain a better understanding of the skill mix and number of workers needed for the effective, efficient, and sustainable management of Namibia’s public sector supply chain, PtD Namibia assisted the MOHSS to conduct a Workload Indicators of Staffing Needs (WISN) study at the CMS and two RMDs to estimate the required number of pharmacists, pharmacist assistants, and clerks/administrative officers required at the national and regional levels of the supply chain.
Activity 3: Rapid Retention Survey of pharmacists and pharmacist assistants and costed retention strategies
This aimed to identify salary and benefit preferences among key health supply chain workforce cadres and projected the estimated costs of implementing the identified job packages using the Capacity
Plus-developed quantitative Rapid Retention Survey (RRS) method, which is based on the discrete choice experiment (DCE) approach.
Activity 4: Supply Chain Performance Improvement program
The purpose of the Supply Chain Performance Improvement (SCPI) program was to build capacity in CMS staff, in particular the distribution section, in International Organization for Standardization (ISO)-accredited warehousing best practices through a modular, adaptable, phased approach.
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Country Partnership Program
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Starting in 2016, PtD is focusing its advocacy efforts and partner resources directly at the country level. This effort intends to support Ministries of Health, NGOs and implementing partners to plan, implement, and sustain reforms which strengthen human resources (HR) for the health supply chain management (SCM).
This effort is called the Country Partnership Program where PtD, through its member organizations, provides a service offering that supports countries to actualize PtD’s HR for SCM advocacy efforts at the country-level through a 12-month engagement.
PtD acts as a “broker of services” whereby it matches country needs with funding and/or PtD members who can supply the service. Potential services include:
- initial scoping
- tailored HR for SCM assessment
- development of a comprehensive HR for SCM strategy
- development of competency frameworks
- development of training plans
Through this partnership program, PtD expects to see increased country engagement and coordination around HR for SCM, and HR for SCM plans/activities/strategies incorporated into Ministry of Health work plans or supply chain strategies. All of which PtD envisions in time will result in country-level supply chain workers who are better equipped to manage their public health supply chains.
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The program is being initiated in Sudan, supporting NMSF, the National Medical Supplies Fund. We will be updating you on progress made.
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PtD is attending the following events, come and find us!
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