Our Capacity Building Strategy

Background

Effective knowledge capacity delivery to system users bears a direct impact on the utilization of Health Information System (HIS) and its value in impacting the delivery of healthcare services to patients. KenyaHMIS has adopted various strategies to deliver capacity to its stakeholders and clients. This spans from the development of training materials to the actual delivery of the training while providing online access to capacity-related content and resources. Over the last few years, we have made significant strides in strengthening the skills of our clients on various HIS solutions that we develop.

In late 2018, direct facility implementation support by KenyaHMIS project  was transitioned to service delivery partners (SDPs) that supported over 700 EMR sites at the time. Due to growing number of EMR facilities, ground level support and maintenance of the implementations became unsustainable.

Fresh scope of EMR support and SDP roles as guided by USG was enforced, where SDPs took up direct support of EMRs at health facilities including deployment of new EMR sites, EMR upgrades, training of end-users and infrastructure provision. This change led to rapid EMR scale-up to over 2400+ sites to date.

Palladium Kenya, through KenyaHMIS project now supports indirect EMR deployment model that is undertaken through SDPs and County mechanisms. Palladium Kenya focuses on the development of HIS products and training ToTs, while the SDP and counties carry out last-mile EMR deployment and maintenance tasks independently at facility level. This process involves empowering the entities through capacity development and mentorship to an optimum level. Palladium also provides a structured service desk to backstop and provide additional direct technical support and user mentorship to both levels.

New Capacity-building strategy

We have employed a strategyy known as cascaded capacity-building approach which ensure that our capacity development is not only cost-effective but also sustainable beyond the project’s lifespan, while achieving the same high level of quality.

Cascaded training strategy

This type of strategy has been effectively used in instances where the magnitude of training demand outweighs the resources and the demands may be recurrent in nature i.e. when the number of trainees is higher, while the resources e.g. time, money, personnel, etc are constrained.  The strategy adopts a multilevel skills transfer where we focus on a small number of relatively skilled set of individuals (referred to as ToT) drawn from both service delivery partners (SDPs) and county ToTs; develop their proficiencies on supported HIS solutions/products over time to a level where they can confidently transfer that knowledge not only within their project teams but also to system end-users at the facility. We also equip them with requisite tools and resources to help them transfer knowledge more effectively.

Through this rigorous training, the ToTs are empowered and tasked with the responsibility of expanding the skills among colleagues at partner levels and well as cascading down the skills to the facility champions and end users.

To ensure optimum end user proficiency on HIS solutions, palladium Kenya through stakeholder engagement team tracks site level training activities conducted by SDPs and county ToTs. Annual surveys are also conducted to the facility end users to assess the training activities and skill retention at the facility level. Results from these surveys are incorporated as part of feedback to modify or streamline the cascaded model to increase its effectiveness.

Fig. 1.1.  Framework for Cascaded Approach to Capacity Building 

Training Delivery

The project adopts a comprehensive and adaptive approach to training delivery, utilizing both didactic and pedagogical methods that have been rigorously tested and refined over time. These methodologies are selected based on their proven suitability in enhancing knowledge retention, learner engagement, and practical application on various HIS topics.

To cater to diverse learning needs and contexts, the project employs a combination of direct and indirect training methods: which  include instructor-led sessions, workshops,  among other aproaches , which are ideal for structured, real-time interaction and immediate feedback. These are delivered in both classroom-based and virtual-based formats, ensuring accessibility regardless of geographic location as well as cost effectiveness.  Indirect methods involve more autonomous learning approaches, such as self-paced learning, which encourage personlaized learning and flexible learning time.

Recognizing the importance of flexibility and scalability, the project supports self-paced online learning through robust eLearning platform. These platform offers a wide range of multimedia content, interactive modules, and assessments, allowing learners to progress at their own pace and revisit materials as needed.

This blended approach ensures that training is not only accessible and inclusive but also aligned with the learning preferences and professional demands of various target groups.

Additional user support

End users and ToTs also benefit from direct access to all training resources for self-paced learning. This included SOP, Job aids and short videos.  To further incentivise users to adopt self-paced learning, we have developed an eLearning platform where users enrol and self-train on our solutions and receive certificates of proficiency and CPD points for professional development. The platform can be accssed from here.

Training Resources

A lot of resources and tools about our products have been developed and publicly hosted for convenient access by our clients. The resources include user manuals, job aids, SOPs etc. that relate to our products. Some of these contents are in video formats while others are in both PDF and PPTs.

The resources can be accessed either through the training repository or on the official project’s YouTube channel.