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Venue: Education Centre, Nevill Hall Hospital
Summary: Previous Dilla Nurses Visit, Oxygen concentrators, neonatal incubator and books, Music for a spring evening fundraising, Visits to Ethiopia, November 2005, WAG Workshop, Dr Aberra’s request for CME, Laboratory Teams Visit to Awassa in March/April, Nursing Link, Support from Gwent Healthcare NHS Trust, WHO Meeting towards GIEESS, Institutional Link between Cardiff and Awassa, National Conference on Links, Fundraising Talk, Annual General Meeting - Reports, Dilla Link Charitable Fund, Election of Officers… Contents - Present
- Apologies
- Minutes of the Last Meeting
- Previous Dilla Nurses Visit
- Oxygen concentrators, neonatal incubator and books
- Music for a spring evening fundraising
- Visits to Ethiopia, November 2005
- WAG Workshop
- Dr Aberra’s request for CME
- Laboratory Teams Visit to Awassa in March/April
- Nursing Link
- Any other Business
- Support from Gwent Healthcare NHS Trust
- WHO Meeting towards GIEESS
- Institutional Link between Cardiff and Awassa
- National Conference on Links
- Fundraising Talk
- Annual General Meeting - Reports
- Dilla Link Charitable Fund
- Election of Officers
- Date of Next Meeting
Introduction
Annual General Meeting Southern Ethiopia Gwent Health Link 5.15pm 31 January 2006 Venue: Education Centre, Nevill Hall Hospital Present
Dave Williams (Chair) Peter Sampson Roger Pickford Marieke Datema (THET) Neil Warren Peter Dale (Minutes) Biku Ghosh Alison Griffiths Michael Marsden Dave Sanders Sandy Holt-Wilson Carole Garrick Apologies
Andrew Cottom John Tovey Sally Venn Miss Hargest Melrose East Neil Mackie Asoka Weerakkody Wendy Warren Sue Bale Aideen Naughton Minutes of the Last Meeting
Agreed Previous Dilla Nurses Visit
Following the previous link meeting in which the Dilla nurses visit was discussed, the link were disappointed that no reports had been received following their visit to South Wales. In addition no evaluation forms had been received. It was felt that such future visits be carefully considered. Oxygen concentrators, neonatal incubator and books
Seven oxygen concentrators have now been sent to Southern Ethiopia via DHL carriers. These are due to be delivered in the coming week although there have been problems at the Ethiopian customs and it was agreed that DHL and THET would spilt the cost of the required custom fee. The oxygen concentrators are being delivered to Awassa, Dilla, Arbaminch and Hosanna hospitals. The neonatal incubator will be transferred to Aswassa hospital as Dilla hospital already has an incubator which was confirmed as working by Dr Dale at the most recent visit. Music for a spring evening fundraising
Friday March 17th The date for this evening has now been confirmed and will start at 7.30pm at St Mary’s Church, Abergavenny. Fliers for this evening were distributed and Biku Ghosh has tickets available. It was confirmed that 400 seats are available for this evening. Visits to Ethiopia, November 2005
Written reports were received from Biku Ghosh, Peter Dale, Asoka Weerakkody, Marieka Datema and Neil Warren. In addition Roger Pickford provided a verbal report following his recent visit. Various areas of these reports were discussed further during the meeting – Marieka Datema’s report was distributed on the day of the meeting. She wished to state that she was impressed by the standard of teaching during the recent visit. She was still awaiting to review the feedback from the ‘Teaching the Teachers’ course. Marieka also suggested that a similar nursing CME link be considered and also that THET were happy to support applications to the British counsel regarding the Cardiff link with Awassa. She also noted that feedback from Dilla has been poor and that this has negative effects on the link. In Biku Ghosh’s report he wished to especially thank Neil Warren for the excellent ‘Teaching the Teachers’ course and agreed with all of those who recently visited Ethiopia that the CME course had proven very successful. The subsequent visit to Yirgalem, however was not successful and has been discussed on many previous occasions. Biku Ghosh suggested that we should be supporting Arbaminch hospital and all agreed. Biku also discussed the stakeholders meeting in which further development of the national task force was discussed in addition to support for CME for the health officers. He also discussed several very successful meetings which have taken place since leaving Ethiopia and that a framework for this national task force is very successfully being developed. Biku reported that the British ambassador agreed to support development of this national framework. All those present at the link meeting were very pleased to hear of this development. Roger Pickford provided a verbal report following his personally sponsored visit. He explained his aims to provide training in obstetric ultrasound scanning to health workers in various units throughout Southern Ethiopia. He wishes to set up teams for ultrasound training, to re-visit with established teams including colleagues from Nevill Hall hospital and set up an obstetric ultrasound service. Following the brief presentation of these reports the link discussed how we may receive feedback following such visits. It was acknowledged that feedback was received in Ethiopia after each course. However it was felt important that more longitudinal data was obtained to judge the success of the training visits. Marieka Datema explained that regional statistics had suggest improvement but that such data is difficult to obtain. She mentioned that pilot studies in Gondar there were a decrease in referrals to regional hospitals following teaching visits and that it is often difficult to quantify the affect of teaching. Sandy Holt-Wilson questioned if it would be better to review the health officers, 2 years after the initial training visits to see if these had resulted in an improvement in clinical management of patients. Biku Ghosh suggested that the training the trainer’s course and CME were of equal importance. WAG Workshop
Biku Ghosh reviewed the recent consultation document which has already been distributed from WAG. WAG have agreed to support voluntary organisations but had raised questions for our link to address personally. Biku asked if members of the link could reply to these questions and would consider both a corporate and individual responses would be appropriate. Dr Aberra’s request for CME
The link had already received a document requesting support for Dr Aberra during his forthcoming sabbatical year. Biku Ghosh further explained this to the link members. All link members acknowledged the very important role that Dr Aberra has been undertaking in support of our link and all present uniformly agreed that we should support Dr Aberra’s CME request. The link would wish to support, as part of his sabbatical, visits to Wales and to help with funding for appropriate surgical and management training courses which may take place in the UK. It was recognised that Dr Aberra would not be able to medically practice in the UK because of registration. It was therefore agreed that the link should provide a maximum sum of £5000 to support Dr Aberra’s CME, including transport costs. This may, for example include working in other east African countries. The link however would wish to look closely at Dr Aberra’s request for various courses etc before providing this funding. Laboratory Teams Visit to Awassa in March/April
Dave Williams explained that the planned visit date is most likely to take place in late March and would include himself, Peter Smith, Paul Harding and Tim Clarke. The aims of this visit would be practical teaching in the university in addition to teaching on equipment use in both the hospital and university. The teaching format would be similar to previous visits including training in microbiology, haematology and blood grouping. In addition further training would be available for the blood bank in Dilla Hospital and in Awassa. The exact timing of this visit was unsure but was determined by at the maximal availability of team members. Nursing Link
Carole Garrick discussed the aim to re-establish the Awassa College nursing link. Carole suggested that a nursing visit may take place at the same time as the laboratory visit this Spring to help re-establish this link. Carole further discussed what midwifery skill training maybe helpful and Biku Ghosh mentioned recent discussions he has had with the head of nursing in Awassa and Dr Aberra regarding emergency skills CME training for nurses. Marieke Datema offered to send further details regarding the “safe hand to mothers” information to Carole. Any other Business
Support from Gwent Healthcare NHS Trust
Biku had received a letter from Stephen Hunter which acknowledged his support and that of the trust for our Ethiopian link. WHO Meeting towards GIEESS
The first WHO Meeting towards First Global Initiative for Emergency and Essential Surgical Skills was held in Geneva in December 2005. Biku presented the work of our Link – CME Experience in Ethiopia. Consensus document is being prepared in support. Institutional Link between Cardiff and Awassa
Biku explained that Professor Tomlinson and Helen Houston had recently discussed Link with this and that there was agreement that there would be initiation of student and staff exchanges. National Conference on Links
This will be taking place on the 7th April 2006 in the Royal Society of Medicine Fundraising Talk
Biku asked if any of the Link members would be happy to provide fundraising talks. It was recognised that Asoka Weerakkody had previously, very successfully talked to the RGH midwives and this had resulted in very successful fundraising. Biku will discuss this with Asoka. Annual General Meeting - Reports
Biku had already distributed the annual report to the Link members. Many areas of this had already been discussed within the meeting and Biku expanded upon some of the specific areas. Dilla Link Charitable Fund
A funding report was distributed and briefly discussed. It was acknowledged that the title should be changed to Southern Ethiopia-Gwent Health Link. The current payroll giving accounts for approximately £600.00 each year. Brief discussions took place as to how this could be further increased. Biku briefly discussed the Hereford – Tanzania Link and how they achieve their funding. Election of Officers
Biku informed the Link that Andrew Cottom wished to withdraw as officer for the Link. The following proposals were made. - Peter Sampson to take on the role as Chairman
- Sandy Holt-Wilson to continue as Vice Chair
- Wendy Warren to continue as Co-Vice Chair
- Biku Ghosh to continue as Link Co-ordinator
- Peter Dale to take on the role as Meeting Secretary
- Alison Griffiths to continue as Treasurer
- Sally Venn to continue as Co-ordinator between the Link and WAG
- Dave Williams to continue the Laboratory Link
- Carole Garrick and Sue Bale proposed as the Nursing Link Co-ordinators
Date of Next Meeting
11th April 2006 at 5.15 p.m. Blorenge Room, Education Centre, NHH.
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Meeting Minutes 
