After work, once every couple of months, I have the luxury of making my way across town to the American College of Nurse-Midwives (ACNM) Washington, D.C. Affiliate meeting to spend a couple of hours eating lukewarm Peruvian chicken and discussing issues affecting midwives at the local and national level. It’s not the meetings themselves that…
The Jordan Ministry of Health’s Strategic Plan 2013-2017 lists both attracting new talent into the public health system and retaining staff as two of its biggest challenges. Because about 3.78 million people in Jordan — including refugees and marginalized populations — rely on services provided by the ministry, a full, committed staff is critical. In…
This blog post originally appeared on the HRH2030 program website. When we think about gender and human resources for health (HRH), we typically think about the challenges women face to fully participate in the workforce. Are women able to enter pre-service education institutions — and complete their courses of study — at the same rate…
During the internship year of my medical training, Peru was affected by a severe El Niño. At that time, millions of people living in the poor peri-urban belt of Lima lacked access to clean water and sanitation services. These factors were a recipe for a massive outbreak of diarrheal diseases in children. The pediatric services…
Earthquakes, hurricanes, epidemics, outbreaks — when disaster strikes, the immediate needs like food, shelter, and medical aid are obvious. It is easy to see these needs as they often manifest in physical and more tangible ways. Yet the residual mental health effects of any crisis, be it a natural disaster, conflict, or a health outbreak…
As the human resources director at the Ministry of Health, you know your country has health workforce challenges. You know that certain regions in the country suffer from maldistribution of health workers with challenges for retention in rural, hard to reach areas. Your reports show that health workers are stationed in rural posts but there…
We need to face facts: In many developing countries, there simply isn’t any money to hire more health care workers. According to WHO there is a global shortage of more than 7 million health care workers; 83 countries fall below WHO’s basic recommendation on of 23 health care providers per 10,000 population. By 2035, that…