224 Health professionals from 7 countries attend 2024 UHAS Research Conference

A total of 224 health professionals from seven countries, including Ghana, converged on Sokode-Lokoe, near Ho last Tuesday for the 2024 University of Health and Allied Sciences (UHAS) Research Conference.

The three-day event is on the theme: “Transforming health systems to achieve Universal Health Coverage in Africa”.

The other participating countries are Switzerland, Cote d’Ivoire, Cameroun, Nigeria, Eswatini (formerly Swaziland), and Togo.

The conference topics include socio-ecological determinants and approaches to health service delivery (Climate change and One Health), Scaling access, delivery and integration of health services and goods (including traditional medicine), new technologies in health and digitalisation of the health system, and health informatics and data science.

The rest are maternal and child health, health promotion (including exercise) with nutrition and hygiene; non-communicable diseases (including mental health), and communicable diseases.

The Director of the Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research, Professor Dorothy Yeboah Manu, who opened the conference, revealed that non-communicable diseases (NCD), such as cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, chronic respiratory disease and cancer were on the rise in Africa.

She said the trend indicated that NCDs would become the leading cause of death in sub-Saharan Africa by 2030, accounting for 42 per cent of all deaths.

Prof. Yeboah Manu explained that Universal Health Coverage (UHC) involved health promotion, prevention of diseases, treatment, rehabilitation and palliative care across the life course.

She said that required strengthening primary health care structurally with functionally resilient-investment, adequate equipment and the  integration of community health workers to deliver essential services, as well as increase rendered services such as the scope of Community Health Planning Services (CHPS).

The Director of the Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research said there was also the need for a robust health information system with regard to digitalisation of health records and real-life data analytics to support decision-making.

Furthermore, she said, it was vital to expand mobile health platforms for tracking disease outbreaks, maternal health and immunisation coverage, with adequate investment in the capacity-building of health workers to collect data and utilise it effectively.

Prof. Yeboah Manu said it was time Ghana adopted strategic health policy reforms with tax exemptions for medical supplies and improvement of the procurement system.