MIHS contributes to professionalism in healthcare

As Uganda strives to improve and modernise its healthcare system, professionalism of the human resource is at the core. The Government has not stopped at reforming guidelines to achieve a professional health workforce, but also appealed to the health training institutions to do the needful.

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At Mildmay Institute of Health Sciences (MIHS) located at Naziba Hill, Lweza, on Entebbe Road in Wakiso district, they are not letting the Government and Ugandans down. “Our aim as an institution is to model professionalism as laid out by the health ministry guidelines. Our resolve is to ensure that our graduates are equipped with both technical skills and professional ethics required to serve Ugandans well,” Edith Akankwasa, the principal MIHS, said. She added:

“When our learners attend to patients in the health facilities, we ensure that they get enough supervision to master all the necessary skills.” The institution, Akankwasa said, works closely with the health and the education ministries to ensure that they adhere to all the policy standards.

“We ensure that we are up to date with the different policy reforms. The ministries also do routine supervision to see if we are conforming to the set standards. They license us to teach the different courses,” she said. The institution, founded on the global objectives of Mildmay that include improvement of health services, offers courses such as nursing and midwifery, training nurses and midwives at certificate and diploma levels.

Other courses include medical laboratory technology offered at certificate and diploma level, applied sciences and clinical medicine. “We train medics of different categories including nurses, midwives,clinical officers, technical
laboratory technologists and technicians, nutritionists, record officers, environmental health officers,” Akankwasa said.

It was necessary to impart the knowledge and expertise we have in different fields in the communities through training professionals in different health fields.” Akankwasa said they endeavour to do research in health facilities, healthdriven organisations and districts, among other entities, so as to ensure that their training is in tandem with the needs of communities where their graduates will work.

“In our studies, we discovered that it goes beyond a medic identifying the sickness, prescribing and administering medicine. They are expected to have effective communication skills both orally and writing to foster confidence. They should be able to manage records as well,” she said.

Akankwasa added that incidents of medics shouting down patients is a sign of lack of professional ethics. “For our learners, from the first day they report, we start equipping them with skills on how they can communicate with the patients, their supervisors and the community. Even during placement, we effectively monitor them to see if they will carry on with the MIH ethics,” she said. Akankwasa said it was necessary for their learners to graduate with computer/information and communication technology skills. She said a graduate from a health institution must be able to do powerpoint presentations, data entries into excel and in case of standard information management systems,be able to use them 

“We use the findings we get in research to give additional skills to our learners, so that they are updated with the changes and challenges brought in by modernity. Akankwasa said MIHS puts emphasis on the right work ethics. “Our learners graduate well knowing that a health worker always keeps and manages time, must dress well in uniform, knows how to store medicine, among others.

The ethics are taught as lessons on top of the courses they offer,” she said. According to the principal, they offer support to the health facilities they work with in communities to meet the health service standards.

Akankwasa added that MIHS has never reneged from the HIV/AIDS fight, and that they have continued to strengthen their response based on the need in the country.

“HIV/AIDS is one of our lessons and we are continuing to equip our trainees with necessary skills of managing patients and prevention, among others,” she said. Akankwasa added that their trainees undergo a leadership programme to equip them with skills of leadership at their places of work. The course, she said, was not limited to
people can apply and do it physically or online.

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Akankwasa said MIHS admits learners starting from O’level certificate holders. “For instance, if you are offering nursing, you must have passed physics, chemistry, biology, English and mathematics. This cuts across most of the courses we offer here. Many attain certificates and advance for diploma and other levels in their specific fields,” she said. The institution also admits candidates with Uganda Advanced Certificate Education, depending on the pass requirements of the course as well as those advancing in their professions, say from certificate to diploma and those specialising in specific  health fields or short health professional courses.

Akankwasa said the institution, with support from their partners, has procured most of the required and expensive equipment. “Equipment is expensive, but to successfully train health professionals, you must have them. But the good news is, it is the area where our partners have greatly helped us.

The truth is that we have the equipment in different laboratories,” she said. Akankwasa said as part of addressing challenges related with placement of their trainees, they have signed memoranda of understanding with different health facilities to ensure that learners have all the necessary support from the staff and administrators of the facilities.

She said the trainees spend about two months on the placement, depending on the duration of their courses. The duration of the courses is between two-anda- half to four years.