Relief for Health Care in Mali
 CIDA is helping to improve Mali's health system
by training paramedics. In their practical courses,
among other things, students learn how sterile
instruments must be delicately handled. |
“It's quite a challenge to meet, but we're encouraged by how willing people are here!” says Noëlla Gagnon. She is a technical assistant in educational development. She is enthusiastically starting her assignment under the Paramedic Training Support Project in Mali.
The Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) supports this project, which aims to strengthen human resources in the health sector by training paramedics. This will improve the quality of service they deliver to the people of Mali.
The Groupe Consultation CCISD and Cégep de Saint-Jérôme (French-only website) were selected to deliver technical and professional advisory services in connection with the merger of three paramedic training schools into one National Health Sciences Training Institute (INFSS).
Future nurses, midwives, and pharmacy and laboratory technicians used to attend different schools. They are now grouped together with future anesthesia, ophthalmology, and otorhinolaryngology technicians to benefit from complete and coherent training.
Noëlla Gagnon is a former nurse from Quebec. She has many years of experience in managing and teaching nurses. She must review 20 different programs. She must develop theoretical and practical teaching manuals. She must carry out clinical internships, development workshops, and trainer training. “It isn't expected to be a seven-year project for nothing,” she jokes. But the scope of the task does not daunt her.
Her colleague, Claude Chayer, is equally motivated. He is a technical assistant in organizational development. He must identify the new institute's administrative needs. He must apply human resources management methods. He must develop computer-based tools. He must develop regulations, organization charts, and work descriptions. His goal is for INFSS to manage itself. “We plan to put sustainable mechanisms in place,” he says. “We're aiming for the people of Mali to own these procedures.”
In addition to making the institute independent, the two assistants hope it will have a national impact. Amadou Sow, the institute's Secretary General, shares this hope: “We want to extend INFSS's leadership and credibility throughout Mali.”
These brave souls are full of good will. But they still have a lot of work ahead of them. A few metres from a crowded classroom, where the professor shows how sterile instruments must be delicately handled, hens strut across a campus with no waste containers. “We need to organize a major clean-up detail,” says Ms. Gagnon.
The lack of available medical equipment is just as much of a major obstacle as lack of hygiene, the educational assistant laments. “If students do not get any hands-on experience with bandages and medical instruments, their practical courses end up looking like theoretical courses…. Clinical internships aren't much different!” These are clearly some of the weaknesses that Mali's health care system must address in the future.
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