Dissemination meetings for Rungwe PBF Pilot Project to Councils and Hospital Management Teams in Mbeya Region

These meetings aimed to disseminate information on Rungwe PBF Pilot Project implementation.  It was done through the Presentation of PBF as health financing Model, and give them feedback on the implementation of Rungwe PBF Pilot Project.

These meetings were conducted in these Councils: For Mbeya City, Kyela, Mbarali, Ileje, Chunya and Mbozi. It was one day meeting for each council. A total of 144 participated. It was conducted in June for Mbeya City and October 2012 for the other remaining Councils.

The Zonal PBF Coordinator presentation was in two parts: PBF as health financing model and Implementation of Rungwe PBF Pilot Project (challenges, success and recommendations). After the presentation, the members have very active and open discussions, and these were the burning issues raised:

-      The Government should adopt PBF  as the Health National Policy as it will solve the performance issue and staff motivation

-      The Health Training Institutions should have PBF in their Curriculum so that the health workers will have insight on the health financing Model

-      The Government should work out the separation of functions for transparency and efficiency in the health sector

-      The Councils and Hospitals Management Teams need more training on the subject  to have full understanding of the Concept and its application to the service delivery in their facilities

-      Staff should be oriented on Entrepreneurship so that they can apply the business principles such as customer care for quality improvement

-      For the sake of  harmony, more clarification on bonuses be made as issues related to staff remunerations can cause conflict in the work place

-      It is important to use internal sources of fund to effect the innovative health financing approaches including PBF, as depending on the donor will undermine sustainability of projects

-      The Government has to review the staff recruitment and employment and let  the Local Government recruit and employ the staff they need for improving accountability

Generally, it was apparent that the management Teams were in favour for change. They will like to   improve Health Services delivery based on Performance due to the staff motivation.  Yet, the hesitation of the Government in adopting new Policies was also noted which needed more advocacy in various decision making levels starting from the local to the national level

The team members promised to apply some PBF Principles to improve health service delivery.

Below is the Group photo of the Council Health and Hospital Management Teams after  the meeting in Mbozi District Council.