Opening Address by the Director-General: Department of Higher
Education and Training, Mr Gwebinkundla Qonde
Director-General of Health: Malebona Matsoso
Deans of the Medical, Health Science and Dental Facilities of our
Universities
Officials from the Departments of Health, and Higher Education and Training I would like to take this opportunity to welcome you to this important joint workshop on the production of health science professionals. This is a truly a milestone for us here today as it marks the beginning of a new approach to planning and supporting the production of doctors, dentists, nurses, pharmacists and other high level and mid-level health science professionals to meet the growing demand for quality health care services in our country.
We will be considering a number of issues over the course of the day and will collaboratively work towards a common purpose. Planning in the past did not focus sufficiently on the development of skills in specific professions but rather at a high level of generality, e.g. looking at the percentage share of programmes at universities in Science, Engineering and Technology (SET), Humanities, Economics and Management Sciences, and leaving it up to the universities to decide on the numbers of students enrolled in specific programmes. In hindsight, this approach may not have been the correct one, as we have lost sight of the need to be specific at the system level in order to ensure that all professions are catered for adequately.
This approach has led us into complacency where our university system has not been able to supply a sufficient number and quality of Health Science Professionals needed for our developmental state. The decision by the Department of Health to send students to Cuba to train as doctors is driven by the lack of capacity of our higher education system to produce sufficient doctors for our own needs. A week ago, 115 students left to study medicine in Cuba as part of the South Africa-Cuba Medical Training Programme which started 16 years ago. The shortage of medical doctors is not a recent problem and although this initiative will assist in alleviating the shortage of medical doctors, it will in fact place our higher education system under further strain in a few years time when they return and still be required to do their clinical training and spend a few years supported by our public institutions, this is a challenge we will collectively have to face.
If we look at our Minister’s Delivery Agreement with the President, there are specific targets which cover human and animal health sciences, engineering, physical and life sciences and teacher education, the only target that our higher education system will comfortably meet by 2014 is Teacher Education. This was due to a concerted effort by the Department, which started in 2007, to focus and support universities to expand teacher education, including the provision of a dedicated bursary fund. We have now started a similar process with other professions which includes the prioritisation of engineering and health sciences.
This workshop is one of the steps of this process which involves undertaking a situational analysis of the current supply of graduates for the medical and health related professions in the country whilst working towards changing processes for enrolment planning in the health sciences to more effectively direct institutional planning towards the systemic and broader demands of various health professions. Another important step is the joint decision by our Department and the National Department of Health to collaboratively work together in planning the expansion of the system. A key focus will be to ensure that we lever sufficient funding to enable this expansion and make it sustainable for the future. I must stress that it is the responsibility of the Higher Education and Training system to produce skilled health and para-professionals to work in health care services, and to help fund institutions to achieve this objective. It will be problematic if we continue to work in silos and engage with universities independently. This has lead to some problems and confusion in the past specifically relating to funding for the expansion outside of the Department’s enrolment planning processes. We now need to go forward in a united manner to ensure that overtime we produce the human resources required for the health care system.
Planning the expansion of health sciences education and the development of health and para-professionals through higher education and the college sector will require consultation and collaboration between the National Department of Health, and Department of Higher Education and Training to ensure that the priority needs of health are being addressed, and the output of health professionals are realised to meet the country’s health service needs.
Towards this goal we are in the process of constituting a high level Joint Health Sciences Education Committee (JHSEC) that will involve senior officials from my department, National Department of Health and National Treasury. Members will also be co-opted from the provincial departments of health and various university faculties to serve on specific technical sub-committees so as to ensure credible planning and provisioning as we go forward. The terms of reference of the committee include amongst others:
- Identifying strategic planning imperatives in health science education;
- Determining the parameters for the realistic expansion of health sciences education in general, specifically with respect to MBChB and other identified health related professions and para-professions based on credible supply and demand data;
- Determining the funding and financing of health sciences education, including the clinical training grant, subsidies, bursaries, health professions training and development grant, private funding and other possible funding sources such as the Health and Welfare Sector Education and Training Authority;
- Facilitating the development of joint agreements between universities and provinces that will govern funding arrangements; and
- Ensuring improved quality of nursing education, bringing Nursing Colleges into the legal framework of higher education, specifically in relation to governance, quality assurance measures and making it a national competency.
I trust that you will commit yourselves to participate in the technical sub-committees of the Joint Health Sciences Education Committee. During this workshop we will be exploring the current status and supply of health sciences professions in South Africa in more detail. Suffice to say we are in a serious situation, particularly with regards to the production of medical doctors. We will also explore the requests by the Department of Health to increase the intakes based on national imperatives, challenges concerning the decision by the Department of Health to send large numbers of students to Cuba for training, funding this expansion, as well as quality of the expansion. We will have to try and understand what will be possible in the short, medium and long term given both the financial and human resources required. We hope to draw on your collective wisdom to help draft a conceptual framework for strategy and funding purposes.
Current institutional targets relating to scarce skills are set until 2013/14, whilst the priorities for the following cycle of enrolment planning, i.e. 2014/15 to 2019/20,needs to be revisited in light of strategic directives and national imperatives highlighted. We need to refine this process as we go forward in order to determine the possible supply needed to support the demand for health science professionals. I trust that your deliberations in the various commissions will lead to reports that incorporate the strategic initiatives, challenges experienced, possible interventions and solutions, and the financial implications that will feed into the broader institutional enrolment planning process as we go forward.
I thank you.
