School for health sector managers to be set up at KMTC
KMTC students. The Health ministry has made it mandatory for hospital executives to undertake management training before taking office. File
What you need to know:
The KIHSM will be a professional centre of excellence charged with training and equipping healthcare workers with relevant management skills.
It will offer in-service teaching to medics in private and public institutions.
The six-month programme will focus on leadership and management of health facilities.
The government will set up a management and leadership training institute for medical practitioners.
The Kenya Institute for Health Systems Management (KIHSM) will be a professional centre of excellence charged with training and equipping healthcare workers with relevant management skills.
“Our objective is to professionalise health systems management,” said Jebichi Maswan, the head of Institutional Advancement at the Kenya Medical Training Institute (KMTC).
Dr Maswan is part of the secretariat set up to oversee the establishment of the institution, which will be the first of its kind in Kenya.
Currently, hospital managers are picked from senior professionals irrespective of their competence in running institutions.
Among universities, the Kenya Methodist University (Kemu), the Management University for Africa (formerly Kenya Institute of Management), Strathmore University, and University of Nairobi are among institutions offering training in health sector management.
However, they have been operating independently with no guidelines from relevant ministries.
KIHSM will be located in Karen on a parcel of land belonging to KMTC’s School of Nutrition. Although the secretariat has already been formed, development of the institution will start once the Ministry of Health and development partners raise funding.
KIHSM, which will in the long run become an independent body, will use KMTC’s network and satellite facilities in Nakuru, Kisumu, and Mombasa to carry out training.
The institute will offer in-service teaching to medics in private and public institutions. The six-month programme will focus on leadership and management of health facilities.
“More programmes will be developed as we go along,” Josephine Mbiyu-Kinyua, the training officer at MSH, a partner organisation, said. She said that Japan International Development Corporation (JICA) was among organisations facilitating training of healthcare sector managers.
A survey conducted by the two ministries of health in 2008 found that 61 per cent of health sector managers were inadequately prepared for leadership and management roles, a scenario that negatively impacts on health service delivery.
The Health ministry has made it mandatory for hospital executives to undertake management training before taking office.
Executives in referral hospitals were among the first lot of administrators to be taken through the training. Most of them had no knowledge on managing health institutions.
