13 September 2016 – As a part of the national injection safety project, an injection practice assessment begun on 12 August 2016.
The assessment includes two elements: holding focus group discussions to assess the knowledge, practice and perceptions of health care workers at hospitals (public and private), primary health care centres and community pharmacies; and measuring community knowledge, practice and perceptions through a community questionnaire of around 2400 households.
The asssessment teams consist of Ministry of Health and Population staff, deployed to conduct the survey in different governorates from the ones they usually work in, with supervisors from the public health departments of various universities across Egypt. A WHO team from the country office and Safe Injection Global Network is supporting and supervising the field-based teams.
The assessment started with the training of 50 surveyors and supervisors, followed by pilot visits to 2 primary health care centres and 2 hospitals. The training was developed and conducted jointly by WHO and the Ministry of Health and Population.
Field work and data collection were then undertaken in 16 health districts across 8 governorates countrywide.
The data entry phase has now begun and will be followed by analysis of the findings and then the production of a final report, including recommendations for action.