Skills Capacity Building For Health Care Services and Research Through the Sickle Pan African Research Consortium

Skills development, the building of human capacity, is key to any sustainable capacity building effort, however, such undertakings require adaptable and tailored strategies. The Sickle Pan-African Research Consortium (SPARCo) is building capacity in sickle cell disease (SCD) management and research in sub-Saharan Africa, including a multi-national SCD patient registry, this is underpinned by skills development activities in data, research, and SCD management. Method: The SPARCo Skills Working Group was set up with the mandate of coordinating skills development activities across the three SPARCo sites in Ghana, Nigeria and Tanzania. To tailor activities to the requirements of the consortium, a needs assessment was conducted at the start of the project which identified skills required for SCD management and research and catalogued existing external and internal training programmes. The needs assessment highlighted differences in skill levels between the sites and different organisational structures which required tailored skills development activities at individual, site and consortium levels. Strategy: Based on the needs and the resources available, different types of training activities were implemented: these included online, blended and face to face activities. In order to create a sustainable skills development programme, existing short, medium, long-term, on-job training activities were used wherever possible. World Sickle Cell Day (19th June) was leveraged for training and health education activities. Results: SPARCo has recorded 1,726 participants in skills development activities across the three sites. Skills have been enhanced in data management, SCD and research to underpin the core deliverables of SPARCo. Conclusion and Lessons Learned: The baseline needs assessments and continual review and adjustment were critical for development of an effective skill development strategy for the consortium. This adaptability was particularly valuable during the COVID-19 pandemic. The sustainability plan leveraged existing programmes and activities and has created a pool of people with required skills for health care and research in SCD. To be effective, skills development programmes need to take into account existing capacity, training opportunities and local conditions. The model was applied to SCD and is adaptable to other skills development in healthcare and research in low and middle- income countries.