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Evaluation of Ethiopia’s field epidemiology training program – frontline: perspectives of implementing partners

BACKGROUND: Field Epidemiology Training Program (FETP) has been adopted as an epidemiology and response capacity building strategy worldwide. FETP-Frontline was introduced in Ethiopia in 2017 as a three-month in-service training. In this study, we evaluated implementing partners’ perspectives with t...

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Autores principales: Kebebew, Tolcha, Woldetsadik, Mahlet A., Barker, Jordan, Cui, Angelina, Abedi, Aisha A., Sugerman, David E., Williams, Desmond E., Turcios-Ruiz, Reina M., Takele, Tariku, Zeynu, Neima
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10131477/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37101262
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12913-023-09384-w
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author Kebebew, Tolcha
Woldetsadik, Mahlet A.
Barker, Jordan
Cui, Angelina
Abedi, Aisha A.
Sugerman, David E.
Williams, Desmond E.
Turcios-Ruiz, Reina M.
Takele, Tariku
Zeynu, Neima
author_facet Kebebew, Tolcha
Woldetsadik, Mahlet A.
Barker, Jordan
Cui, Angelina
Abedi, Aisha A.
Sugerman, David E.
Williams, Desmond E.
Turcios-Ruiz, Reina M.
Takele, Tariku
Zeynu, Neima
author_sort Kebebew, Tolcha
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Field Epidemiology Training Program (FETP) has been adopted as an epidemiology and response capacity building strategy worldwide. FETP-Frontline was introduced in Ethiopia in 2017 as a three-month in-service training. In this study, we evaluated implementing partners’ perspectives with the aim of understanding program effectiveness and identifying challenges and recommendations for improvement. METHODS: A qualitative cross-sectional design was utilized to evaluate Ethiopia’s FETP-Frontline. Using a descriptive phenomenological approach, qualitative data were collected from FETP-Frontline implementing partners, including regional, zonal, and district health offices across Ethiopia. We collected data through in-person key informant interviews, using semi-structured questionnaires. Thematic analysis was conducted, assisted with MAXQDA, while ensuring interrater reliability by using the consistent application of theme categorization. The major themes that emerged were program effectiveness, knowledge and skills differences between trained and untrained officers, program challenges, and recommended actions for improvement. Ethical approval was obtained from the Ethiopian Public Health Institute. Informed written consent was obtained from all participants, and confidentiality of the data was maintained throughout. RESULTS: A total of 41 interviews were conducted with key informants from FETP-Frontline implementing partners. The regional and zonal level experts and mentors had a Master of Public Health (MPH), whereas district health managers were Bachelor of Science (BSc) holders. Majority of the respondents reflected a positive perception towards FETP-Frontline. Regional and zonal officers as well as mentors mentioned that there were observable performance differences between trained and untrained district surveillance officers. They also identified various challenges including lack of resources for transportation, budget constraints for field projects, inadequate mentorship, high staff turnover, limited number of staff at the district level, lack of continued support from stakeholders, and the need for refresher training for FETP-Frontline graduates. CONCLUSIONS: Implementing partners reflected a positive perception towards FETP-Frontline in Ethiopia. In addition to scaling-up the program to reach all districts to achieve the International Health Regulation 2005 goals, the program also needs to consider addressing immediate challenges, primarily lack of resources and poor mentorship. Continued monitoring of the program, refresher training, and career path development could improve retention of the trained workforce.
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spelling pubmed-101314772023-04-27 Evaluation of Ethiopia’s field epidemiology training program – frontline: perspectives of implementing partners Kebebew, Tolcha Woldetsadik, Mahlet A. Barker, Jordan Cui, Angelina Abedi, Aisha A. Sugerman, David E. Williams, Desmond E. Turcios-Ruiz, Reina M. Takele, Tariku Zeynu, Neima BMC Health Serv Res Research BACKGROUND: Field Epidemiology Training Program (FETP) has been adopted as an epidemiology and response capacity building strategy worldwide. FETP-Frontline was introduced in Ethiopia in 2017 as a three-month in-service training. In this study, we evaluated implementing partners’ perspectives with the aim of understanding program effectiveness and identifying challenges and recommendations for improvement. METHODS: A qualitative cross-sectional design was utilized to evaluate Ethiopia’s FETP-Frontline. Using a descriptive phenomenological approach, qualitative data were collected from FETP-Frontline implementing partners, including regional, zonal, and district health offices across Ethiopia. We collected data through in-person key informant interviews, using semi-structured questionnaires. Thematic analysis was conducted, assisted with MAXQDA, while ensuring interrater reliability by using the consistent application of theme categorization. The major themes that emerged were program effectiveness, knowledge and skills differences between trained and untrained officers, program challenges, and recommended actions for improvement. Ethical approval was obtained from the Ethiopian Public Health Institute. Informed written consent was obtained from all participants, and confidentiality of the data was maintained throughout. RESULTS: A total of 41 interviews were conducted with key informants from FETP-Frontline implementing partners. The regional and zonal level experts and mentors had a Master of Public Health (MPH), whereas district health managers were Bachelor of Science (BSc) holders. Majority of the respondents reflected a positive perception towards FETP-Frontline. Regional and zonal officers as well as mentors mentioned that there were observable performance differences between trained and untrained district surveillance officers. They also identified various challenges including lack of resources for transportation, budget constraints for field projects, inadequate mentorship, high staff turnover, limited number of staff at the district level, lack of continued support from stakeholders, and the need for refresher training for FETP-Frontline graduates. CONCLUSIONS: Implementing partners reflected a positive perception towards FETP-Frontline in Ethiopia. In addition to scaling-up the program to reach all districts to achieve the International Health Regulation 2005 goals, the program also needs to consider addressing immediate challenges, primarily lack of resources and poor mentorship. Continued monitoring of the program, refresher training, and career path development could improve retention of the trained workforce. BioMed Central 2023-04-26 /pmc/articles/PMC10131477/ /pubmed/37101262 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12913-023-09384-w Text en © This is a U.S. Government work and not under copyright protection in the US; foreign copyright protection may apply 2023 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Open AccessThis article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) . The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) ) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.
spellingShingle Research
Kebebew, Tolcha
Woldetsadik, Mahlet A.
Barker, Jordan
Cui, Angelina
Abedi, Aisha A.
Sugerman, David E.
Williams, Desmond E.
Turcios-Ruiz, Reina M.
Takele, Tariku
Zeynu, Neima
Evaluation of Ethiopia’s field epidemiology training program – frontline: perspectives of implementing partners
title Evaluation of Ethiopia’s field epidemiology training program – frontline: perspectives of implementing partners
title_full Evaluation of Ethiopia’s field epidemiology training program – frontline: perspectives of implementing partners
title_fullStr Evaluation of Ethiopia’s field epidemiology training program – frontline: perspectives of implementing partners
title_full_unstemmed Evaluation of Ethiopia’s field epidemiology training program – frontline: perspectives of implementing partners
title_short Evaluation of Ethiopia’s field epidemiology training program – frontline: perspectives of implementing partners
title_sort evaluation of ethiopia’s field epidemiology training program – frontline: perspectives of implementing partners
topic Research
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10131477/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37101262
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12913-023-09384-w
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