3 June 2021, by Minh NGUYEN

Human Resource for Health is the cornerstone of the health system. Specifically, in Health Supply Chain system, the health workforce plays a critical role in ensuring that health and immunization commodities can be delivered with the sufficient quality and quantity, in the appropriate condition, at the right time, in the right place and at the right cost. At GaneshAID, we are upskilling of the enablers of health workforce performance and promoting efficient strategies. We aim to generate evidence which are essential to formulate policies for equitable health and immunization outcomes in low-to-middle-income countries.

Health supply chain workforce in the current global health emergency situation

In the situation of increasing global health problems, such as outbreaks, pandemic, thus increased requirements of medical products, it is critical for countries to strengthen their disease detection and epidemic response systems. Health Commodity Supply Chain system must, therefore, be able to meet the evolving public health and health security demands.

As a cornerstone of the system, health and immunization supply chain workforce performance are critical to ensure the response-ability of the system to emerging problems of the supply chain including inadequate procurement and product estimation, lack of transportation capacity, incorrect conditions of storage or inappropriate use, and so on.

Insufficient quantity and substandard quality of human resources for health and immunization supply chain are challenging countries in providing reliable access to essential health products.

It is of great importance to attain an appropriate training strategy and human resource for health policy which could empower the health workforce to cope with the supply chain system’s requirements. In this case, a strong landscape analysis is recommended to diagnose the existing symptoms in the system and to propose institutional solutions that could improve the health workforce for health supply chain management.

| A landscape analysis using a verified assessment tool is critical to diagnose the symptoms of the health workforce and to identify optimal solutions to improve the situation. |

Tool to generate evidence for training strategy to enhance the health supply chain workforce performance

Commissioned by People that Deliver, GaneshAID used Human Resource for Supply Chain Management (HR4SCM) Theory of Change to assess the ecosystem of the health supply chain management in Vietnam and Thailand. The tool covers four pathways: Staffing, Skills, Working Conditions and Motivation. The tool helped to identify the gaps of staff’s performance on their competencies in the ecosystem of health supply chain and the health system. The indicators to evaluate include internal and external factors to facilitate the performance of the health supply chain workforce.

The Training Needs Analysis (TNA), developed by UNICEF, as a basic tool to develop roadmap for enhancing the health supply chain workforce performance, provides a set of resources for country-driven and low cost SCM training, mapping, analysis and planning. It provides a systematic way for identifying training based on defined SCM competencies within the public health supply chain. The People that Deliver (PtD) Initiative Competency Compendium is introduced as the primary basis for the TNA methodology (Module II). Training options are described, as well as the stepped approach to carrying out a TNA as the basis for developing a Training Strategy (Module III) and Training Plan (Module IV).

The TNA reveals that there are critical needs to enhance the competency of the current health workforce dedicated to supply chain. These critical needs are the basis for developing training modules/programs on public health supply chain using a modular approach. A training strategy is developed to address the needs of existing supply chain staff or whose tasks related to supply chain and the needs of future generation of supply chain professionals in the system.

| Training needs analysis findings are the evidence-based sources to transform the needs in competency strengthening of the health workforce into concrete roadmap for improvement. | 

At GaneshAID, we are generating evidence-based recommendations for decision makers to develop policies that could improve the performance of the health service, and increase the health quality, effectiveness and equity. 

As you might have heard of HR4SCM Theory of Change, we would love to hear your ideas on this topic. What do you think about the assessment tools for the performance of health and immunization supply chain? Are there any other tools that serve the same purpose? Please share with us below in the comment section.