Even before the Corona pandemic began, DIFÄM and the local partner organisation TINKISSO developed digital training courses to improve the quality of health care. Among other things, the training focuses on improving maternal and child health care, the availability of medicines, hygiene, job security and the motivation of hospital staff. Currently, staff from several governmental and confessional hospitals are taking part in the classes.
As it soon became clear, further training courses are only successful if the participants are not left alone to do their own studies. Hospitals usually do not have the necessary IT equipment and many participants lack the technical know-how to be able to use a purely online course.
Therefore, digital training is supported by on-site classroom events as part of the so-called blended learning approach (integrated learning). DIFÄM has equipped the partner hospitals with a training room for this purpose, offered IT training and trained the quality officers as trainers. In the meantime, regular trainings are now held for the hospital staff. The quality officers organise learning sessions in their hospitals where the videos can be watched and discussed together. During the Corona pandemic, trainings in small groups were held in accordance with the rules.
What we have learned bears fruit
The participants are enthusiastic about the blended learning approach and first successes are already evident, individually and at hospital level. Many are happy about the newly gained IT skills and are now taking part in various digital training courses. But quality management in the hospitals has also been improved. The fact that the motivation of staff has increased can be seen in the 20 percent increase of staff attendance rates. Regular meetings of the hygiene committees take place in all hospitals. New ideas and plans have also been developed to achieve further improvements.