Scholarship / NETWORKING FOR HEALTHCARE- NETWORKING ESSAY FOR CHEVENING SCHOLARSHIP [2]

networking in physician services

Networking is about linking individuals, exchanging services and/or ideas of interest. Several times I have used my relationships to ameliorate my services as a physician. When relationships are made, one has to follow-up and be ready to play the long-term game in order to keep contact.

I am always keen to broaden my network when involved in arranged or chanced meetings. Last year, Cameroonian doctors were called upon to a meeting that would build the foundation for a medical syndicate. On arrival, I met colleagues from home and abroad and from diverse specialties. I spared no time to create new links by exchanging contacts and also discussing different points of interests. As an active member of this syndicate, I continue to interact with my colleagues, especially through a social media group of about 600 members. Here, we discuss issues plaguing our profession and share different ideas and professional opportunities.

I am currently working on curbing birth related complications in my locality. The main cause of this being pregnant women not knowing when labor could begin and hence end up giving birth at home due to the long distance to the hospital. This prompted me to liaise with my classmate, the medical director of XXX - a startup involved in ameliorating the medical follow-up of pregnant women. After presenting my case, we are both working on the possibility of including my locality into the program so that pregnant women could have a better follow-up and hence reduce home births.

Another instance when I used my networking skills was in ameliorating the follow-up of my AIDS patients; many of whom have difficulties coming back for control visits after commencing treatment. In the past, I had cooperated and kept good relationships with catholic missionaries who ran a "XXXX" fund in their church. This fund was used to help parishioners who could not afford healthcare. Most of my AIDS patients being poor and abandoned could benefit from this fund. I advocated at the "XXXX" for an enlargement of their target population and presented to them a list of some patients in need of help. My advocacy at the "CARITAS" permitted some of my patients to be included in the fund with a possibility of adding more with time. Most importantly, a volunteer was provided to help do a door to door follow-up of some patients; acting as a liaison between the patients and the hospital. This has gone a long way to increase patients' compliance to treatment.

As a Chevening scholar, I will engage with other scholars and alumni, especially with those in my field, sharing ideas and experiences. This will permit me share my own network, develop relationships and career opportunities for myself and others. Also, I will create a social media forum to help prospective candidates with tips on the Chevening application procedure. After my studies, I will network with incoming scholars hence enriching the Chevening community with my own experiences. The Chevening community in my country and the world at large is very diverse; I hope to use my networking skills to meet people of interest to my goal of ameliorating the access to healthcare in my country.

Scholarship / "TO LEAD IS TO INFLUENCE"...CHEVENING LEADERSHIP QUESTION [3]

1)Chevening is looking for individuals that will be future leaders or influencers in their home countries. Explain how you meet this requirement, using clear examples of your own leadership and influencing skills to support your answer.

(minimum word count: 50 words, maximum word count: 500 words)

a physician leads and influences others

I believe to lead is to analyze and solve problems, innovate and develop other people while influencing is to persuade and/or inspire others to commit to a particular vision. Also, to lead is to influence. Being a physician requires that I lead and influence others through my teachings and advices.

My first experience in a leadership role goes back to my years in high school when I was appointed as food prefect in the student government. My role was to make estimates of the amount of food to be prepared for a total of 460 students, make sure this food was cooked in good hygienic conditions and served at the right time. Notwithstanding the respect I owed the cooks who were elders, I always had to find a way to impact a change especially when hygienic standards were not respected; I had to earn my leadership position. The particularity in this experience is that I learned to persuade, create relationships and sometimes make concessions in order to make my points go through. I remember to have promoted hand washing and avoidance of fingernail painting among the cooks by sharing with them personal hygiene tips I had learned from my biology lectures. With the school administration's help, some of these tips were printed out and pasted in the school kitchen to serve as a reminder.

Working as a physician for about three years now has gone a long way to test my leadership and influencing skills and also taught me a lot. Apart from making diagnoses, it is my role to coordinate the activities of my nurses and participate in the organization of the hospital services. When I arrived at my current workplace, I found out that nursing services were inadequate. Almost all ameliorations I tried to impose were systematically not respected. At first, I took a more punitive and repressive role towards the nurses, but things got worse; I faced even more resistance. With time, I came to notice that building a more cordial relationship facilitated my work. I had to be friendly to my subordinates and open to their ideas so that they feel personally involved in the necessary adjustments.

I have succeeded to make weekly meetings with the hospital staff a regular practice. This is a medium for the staff to make appreciations on the quality of service offered and give ameliorative proposals. This same technique of interactive meetings has been adopted by the chief nurses to manage their personnel in their various units. This has permitted innovation and personal development in the hospital.

As a civil servant, I am in a good position to lead and influence people and opinions. I have learned a lot from my past experiences and my current job has proven to be a good opportunity to lead and influence others. The courses I have applied to study are centered on management and leadership. As a Chevening alumnus, I will be better equipped to lead in my hospital and community.

Scholarship / STUDYING TO BETTER HEALTHCARE-CHEVENING COURSE CHOICE QUESTION [4]

3)Outline why you have selected your chosen three university courses, and explain how this relates to your previous academic or professional experience and your plans for the future.

*Please do not duplicate the information you have entered on the work experience and education section of this form (minimum word count: 50 words, maximum word count: 500 words)

three courses for public sector physician

My years as a medical student and now a medical doctor have exposed me to several challenges plaguing the health sector of my country. My selected courses are all geared towards finding solutions to some of these challenges.

The health and public service management course at the University of South Wales is my first choice. This course fits within my objectives, with modules on leadership, public service management and innovation as well as research. Most importantly, lectures are dispensed by leaders in the public sector who also share their experiences in this sector. The Pontypridd campus where the course is dispensed is a quiet place and hence conducive for studies.

My second choice, at the University of Sheffield, is public health geared towards leadership and management. Apart from the fact that there is an excellent library, this course combines health management and health economics. This is will permit me understand the intricacies of financing the health sector.

My third course choice in on public health development. This course, offered by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, is structured for low income countries like mine. It equips with skills needed to analyze the public health sector and design corrective measures to problems identified.

During medical training, I had several community medicine internships in rural areas as well as health campaigns organized by student associations. This introduced me to the functioning of public service health institutions and the health related difficulties faced by the communities they serve. I noticed that adequate healthcare was difficult to afford, but most importantly, hospitals were poorly equipped and managed.

As a public sector physician, I have had a forefront taste of some of the management challenges in public hospitals. Financial influx into the health system is low, but I have witnessed several instances where funds have been allocated to projects which do not contribute to innovation or amelioration of the quality of healthcare provided.

More so, most strategic positions in the public health sector are being held by people with little or no formal training in the management of health systems. Added to the centralized nature of this sector, decision making is slow and usually inappropriate to the actual problems faced on the field. I wish to better manage public health structures in my country, through adequate leadership, policy making and innovation. This prompted me to choose my selected courses. A Masters degree from one of the above high ranking universities will also serve as promotional material in my career.

In the future, I hope to get more involved in leadership and/or managerial positions which will permit me to contribute to the proper functioning of my country's healthcare system. Either of these courses will provide me with skills and knowledge to better diagnose the health sector and hence provide adequate solutions.