eBusiness Weekly
Sifelani Tsiko
HARARE – The University of Zimbabwe Institute of Continuing Health Education will this week host the 26th edition of the Annual Medical Research Day to highlight and celebrate the scientific work being done by local researchers to strengthen the country’s health delivery system.
Running under the theme: “Promoting Health Systems Research for Improvement of the Quality of Care in Zimbabwe,” the annual medical research day will be held in Harare on October 20.
Veteran urology surgeon and director of the UZ Institute of Continuing Health Education, Mr Christopher Samkange said in an interview yesterday that the research event sought to showcase and offer innovative solutions to some of the country’s pressing healthcare problems.
“We want to promote research and innovation as a tool for improving the quality of health care in the country,” he said.
“We want to showcase innovative solutions to some of the gaps in our healthcare delivery system. We are looking at how research can be used as a tool to improve care within our available resources. As a country we are not able to buy more or spend more on drugs and medical accessories because of serious foreign currency constraints.
“At this event, we are saying, what can we do as researchers to promote innovative solutions that can bring meaningful results using less resources.”
In addition to this, Mr Samkange said the annual medical research day sought to disseminate research findings and promote the uptake into policy formulation and implementation, change of practice with expectation of improved health outcomes for the country’s population.
“We want to share our research outputs with medical practitioners and policymakers so that they can use some of the ideas to improve on policy and healthcare service delivery as a whole,” he said.
In 2017, a research paper analysing mislabelling of samples on HIV testing for babies and another on poor management of the protocol for rape cases led to profound changes in the country’s healthcare delivery system after corrective action was taken by practitioners.
The annual medical research day will bring together the brightest minds across the UZ Medical School to share their research with peers.
A number of papers will be presented at the event. Up to 300 people are expected to participate at the annual medical research day.
The new UNICEF Representative to Zimbabwe Dr Mohamed Ayoya is expected to give the keynote address.
The event will also feature research posters from students, faculty and collaborative researchers in the country spanning the fields of biomedical, educational and clinical research among a whole range of topics in the field of medicine.
Researchers with the best papers will walk away with prizes.
