Health Workers Strengthen Educational Communication Skills
“The most important thing I learned during this workshop was a step-by-step approach for developing communication strategies,” said Zaur Ibrahimov at the closing session of the USAID-sponsored “Basics of Health Communication” workshop. “Now I have systematic knowledge of modern communication techniques which will help me a lot in my everyday activities”.
Ibrahimov is a professional journalist currently on staff with the public relations department of the Center of Public Health and Reform (CPHR) within Azerbaijan’s Ministry of Health (MoH). He and eleven of his CPHR colleagues recently participated in a tailored, three-day workshop organized by USAID’s Primary Health Care Strengthening Project (PHCS).
The CPHR public relations department is staffed by young, energetic people with backgrounds in media, sociology and public affairs. However, they lack the skills and expertise in health communications vital for developing successful, nationwide interventions to promote healthy lifestyles and inform the public on MoH policy.
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The Health Communication workshop provided the employees of Azerbaijan’s Ministry of Health with basic skills in health communication
Photo Credit: Abt Associates |
Responding to this need, the PHCS Project organized a workshop to train both the CPHR public relations staff and employees of the People’s Health Departments with basic health communication skills.
The PHCS Project has a strong, long-standing relationship with the CPHR, and has provided technical expertise on issues related to health reform and capacity-building capacity to this relatively new part of the MoH. One of the Project’s components, strengthening the government’s capacity in health promotion, selectively targets expanding the CPHR’s capabilities to mount effective national-level information, education and communication activities.
Taking into account the leadership and coordination roles of CPHR staff in developing and delivering national health communication messages, the “Basics of Health Communication” workshop was designed to embrace the participants’ professional needs and areas of interest. Over three days of numerous presentations and group work, the participants learned how to develop a communication strategy and create a media campaign. Participants were instructed to craft a tuberculosis campaign, so that they would be able to utilize their work to raise awareness on World TB Day.
“The group exercises we had during the workshop were very important for me,” said Tofig Musayev, the newly appointed head of the People’s Health Department. “This allowed me to engage my staff in real team work”.
All participants expressed their satisfaction with the workshop, and agreed that further training would be important for building their expertise and broadening their understanding of health communications.
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