The Sunday News
Dumisani Nsingo, Senior Reporter
MORE than 400 doctors and pharmacists will converge on Bulawayo for the joint College of Primary Health Care Physicians of Zimbabwe (CPCPZ) and Pharmaceutical Society of Zimbabwe (PSZ) annual congress this month.
A member of the local organising committee, Dr Cherifa Sururu said the joint congress was aimed at encouraging best practice, research and innovation among academics, regulators and practitioners as well as fostering collaboration from all sectors of the medical profession.
This year’s congress will run from 24 to 26 April under the theme: “Ensuring access to quality healthcare services and essential medicines for all”.
Said Dr Sururu: “This is a unique union between two trade professions — pharmaceuticals and the doctors. Among the presenters and some of the invited guests will be people from other specialties, we have opticians, physicians and pathologists. So it becomes a full mix of talents, experience, scientific training and background and this runs well with the theme “Ensuring access to healthcare service and essential medicines for all.”
He said it was also of paramount importance to acknowledge the role played by primary health care people in the health delivery system. Primary care is health care provided in the community for people making an initial approach to a medical practitioner or clinic for advice or treatment.
“Sometimes when the patient goes to a central hospital they don’t repeat the same information (about how they are feeling). For instance, let’s say the problem is malnutrition at the hospital they will treat malnutrition but it will be primary health care people that would have said it’s malnutrition. So they are in a position to pick certain information, which is very useful for the strengthening of the health delivery system,” said Dr Sururu.
He said plans were underway to invite President Emmerson Mnangagwa to officially open the congress.
“As for the guest of honour, we have targeted the President himself because of the new political dispensation we are in. We are talking of 30 years of our annual meetings, which is the whole duration of the old Government. So there are many concerns, seeing that this Government has just started we need to articulate this so that he (President Mnangagwa) knows that there is a big gap that we feel exists between the policy makers, community and the practitioners. So working together is most likely to give us that one health delivery system,” said Dr Sururu.
PSZ member and convener of the congress, Mr Raphael Sagonda said the symposium will give medical practitioners an opportunity to meet and map the way forward towards improving the country’s health delivery system.
“This is when pharmacists and doctors get to meet and exchange ideas and knowledge with regards to latest trends, knowledge and whatever is on offer on the medical field for the betterment of our profession and the whole of Zimbabwe,” he said.
Mr Sagonda said the theme of the congress was in line with the World Health Organisation’s Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) number three which aims to ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages.
“The theme is coming from the SDG number three, which is basically talking about making sure the whole of Zimbabwe continues to have quality health and access to essential medicines whether you are in any rural or remote settlement we want to ensure you have quality health care,” he said.
@DNsingo
