Strengthening Specialised Clinical Services in the Pacific

Strengthening Specialised Clinical
Services in the Pacific
NEWSLETTER
Volume 1 No.1
May 2011
In This
Issue
New Programme to
Support Specialised
Clinical Services
Inaugural Meeting of
SSCSiP’s Stakeholder
Reference Group
Situational Analysis
of Specialist Clinical
Services in the Pacific
Meeting of the SSCSiP
Technical Advisory Group
New Website for Pacific
Clinical Services
SSCSiP Offers
Scholarships for O&G
Specialist Training
SSCSiP Supports a
Cardiac Catheterization
Visit to Fiji
SSCSiP will Support a
Specialist Eye Team to
Visit the Solomons
Preparing for cardiac catheterization and angiography: Dr Vijay Kapadia, Australian
based RN Adriana Coetzee, together with Fiji Registered nurses Tuliana and Maca.
A NEW PROGRAM TO
SUPPORT SPECIALIZED
CLINICAL SERVICES IN
THE PACIFIC
Since the 1978 Alma Ata Declaration,
Primary Health Care (PHC) has been the
cornerstone of national health strategic
plans in the Pacific. While acknowledging
the importance of PHC, there are parallel
needs for secondary and tertiary services, to
be able to address more complex established
or non-preventable conditions, support
health care workers in the community, and
meet community expectations of effective
health care.
Strengthening of Specialised Clinical
Services (SSCSIP) is a new AusAID-funded
Program tasked with;
1. Supporting Pacific Island Countries
(PICs) to plan for, access, host and
evaluate specialized clinical services.
2. Strengthening local health worker
skills, capacity and capability to meet
clinical service needs.
The underlying rationale for the program
is to achieve better planning and improved
local capacity to meet secondary and tertiary
health needs in a way that is appropriately
balanced against each country’s primary and
preventive care priorities.
The program will be implemented by the
Development and Coordination Team
(DaCT), based at the Fiji School of
Medicine, which will work closely with
all participating countries and service
providers. The work of the DaCT team will
be guided by the SSCSIP Working Group,
Clinical Specialist Advisors, and the Pacific
Island Ministries of Health. The program
will assist countries to strengthen their
specialised clinical services by:
• Supporting their capacity to plan,
prioritize and manage clinical services;
• Helping to coordinate specialized clinical
service provision in each country and
across the region through consolidated
biennial planning, and linking those
plans with appropriate support services
(e.g. biomedical engineering, radiology,
blood transfusion services);
• Ensuring that specialist services
maintain a focus on skills transfer and
capacity development;
• Informing development partner support
for the long-term enhancement of
health worker, institutional and systems
capacity to meet specialised clinical
service needs within each country and
across the Pacific region; and
• Supporting measurement of program
effectiveness at country and regional
level.
The PICs covered by the SSCSIP program
include Palau, Federated States of Micronesia,
Marshall Islands, Nauru, Kiribati, Tuvalu,
Fiji, Tonga, Samoa, Tokelau, Niue, Solomon
Islands, Cook Islands and Vanuatu.

THE INAUGURAL MEETING OF THE SSCSiP’S
STAKEHOLDER REFERENCE GROUP (SRG)
The SSCSIP Stakeholder Reference Group (SRG) held its Inaugural Meeting at the Tanoa International Hotel,
Nadi - Fiji in December last year. Attended by management heads from Health Ministry’s across the Pacific,
along with representatives from the College of Medicine, Dean Ian Rouse and Dr. Berlin Kafoa with admin
support team from the Projects Office, including AusAid partners. This being the first meeting of the SSCSIP
SRG, with the main aim to raise awareness about the SSCSIP and provide an avenue for discussion between PICs
and partners for the way forward for strengthening specialized clinical services in the region.
The stakeholder reference group is set up as a mechanism for annual high-level advice, oversight and feedback on
the program. The next meeting of the Stakeholder reference group will be held in August later this year.
SITUATIONAL ANALYSIS OF SPECIALIST CLINICAL SERVICES IN THE
PACIFIC.
Strengthening specialized clinical services in the Pacific would have been a rather uncomplicated process had the state of
development in the area of clinical services been the same throughout the Pacific region. Given the diversity in clinical
services capacity around the region, there will be no generic solution for the region’s specialized clinical needs.
To allow Development and Coordination Team (DaCT) better plan and fulfill its role in supporting and strengthening specialized
clinical services in the Pacific, there is a need for country-specific baseline data to allow the SSCSIP to ‘map’ national capacity
for specialised clinical services, in each country and regionally. This mapping exercise will allow the SSCSIP to identify
capacity building needs for nominated specialised clinical services.
In the months of March and April, the SSCSIP had been contracting consultants to conduct the situational analysis in 13 PICs,
assisted by the clinical/hospital directors in each country. The country reports will be released in the upcoming months.

MEETING OF THE
SSCSiP TECHNICAL
ADVISORY GROUP
•
•
interest to clinical specialists
News and upcoming events related to specialised
clinical services.
Any postings from PICs related to specialised
clinical services
The Technical Advisory Group (TAG) for the SSCSIP
Program held its second meeting in May earlier at the
Sofitel, in Nadi. The TAG provides a mechanism for
expert input into the ‘planning’ and ‘process evaluation’
of SSCSiP activities. One of the important roles of the
TAG is to ensure SSCSiP plans are technically sound,
evidence based, feasible, country-driven, and are
within the scope of the program’s terms of office. The
outcomes of the TAG meeting will be reviewed and
endorsed in the August Meeting of the Stakeholder
Reference Group Meeting to be attended by Clinical
Directors from the 13 PICs.
Members of the TAG include some familiar names in
the Pacific health arena and comprise of – Dr Eddie
McCaig, Dr Dr Tearikivao Maoate (known by many
as Dr Kiki), Mrs Debbie Sorensen, Dr Rosalina
Saaga-Banuve (known by many as Dr Rosa), Dr
Gregory Dever (known by many as Dr Greg), the FNU
Dean of the Schools of Medicine, Nursing & Health
Sciences Dr Ian Rouse, Dr Ifereimi Waqanibete, Lord
Vilaimi Tangi, Mrs Paulini Sesevu from AusAID Suva
office, Ms Nehal Kapadia (biomedical engineer) and
members of the DaCT team (Dr Berlin Kafoa, Dr
Silina Fusimalohi & Dr Revite Kirition).
The website is being constructed and will be
continuously be updated over the coming months. For
more information or postings please contact Dr Revite
Kirition (revite.kirition@fnu.ac.fj).
Dr Ioanna Beiatau from Kiribati
NEW WEBSITE FOR PACIFIC
CLINICAL SERVICES
(www.sscsip.org)
For better planning, coordination and information
sharing, the SSCSiP will be developing and
maintaining a website for specialised clinical services
in the Pacific.
The website will be featuring:
• General information about the SSCSiP program
• A list of specialised clinical service providers for
the region. (Will provide useful information to
PICs)
• The clinical services profiles and capacity of
each PIC to host specialist medical teams. (Will
provide useful information for visiting service
providers)
• Annual schedule of specialist teams visits to all
PICs
• List of available clinical training programmes
(short term & long term) and clinical training
providers
• List or conferences or workshops of particular
SSCSiP OFFERS
SCHOLARSHIPS FOR
O&G SPECIALIST
TRAINING
The SSCSIP has awarded a scholarship to
Dr Ioanna Beiatau from Kiribati to cover
the first year of her Master of Medicine,
Obstetrics & Gynecology (O&G) training
program at the Fiji School of Medicine.
Dr Beiatau had been offered a place in the
O&G training program in 2011; however
she was not able to secure a scholarship
to support her training. Given the dire
need for O&G specialists in Kiribati,
the Kiribati Ministry of Health made an
official request to SSCSIP for funding to
support Dr Beiatau’s training. SSCSiP is
funding Dr. Ioanna’s Masters program
and the SSCSiP Program will be funding
a number of capacity building initiatives
for the 13 PICs and details of these will be
shared with the PIC Ministries of Health
in the coming days.

Australian Based cardiologist Dr Vijay Kapadia with CWMH cardiac unit staff
SSCSiP SUPPORTS A CARDIAC CATHETERIZATION VISIT TO FIJI
A generous donation from the Australian Rotary Club saw the establishment of a two million dollars state of the
art Coronary Angiographic Unit at the CWM Hospital in Suva two years ago. The problem, however, was that
Fiji does not have a Specialist Interventional Cardiologist, and the Ministry of Health in Fiji has been depending
on the services of Australian-based Dr Vijay Kapadia (a former Fiji citizen) to provide coronary angiography.
In response to a request by the Fiji Ministry of Health to support Dr Kapadia’s visit to Fiji in February, the SSCSIP
funded the air fares and per diems for Dr Kapadia’s team which saw angiograms performed on 34 patients and
two angioplasties. The visit has also seen capacity building activities for the local doctors and nurses.
The SSCSIP Program will be funding specialised clinical team visits requested by PICs, and details of this will
be shared with the PIC Ministries of Health in the coming days.
SSCSiP WILL SUPPORT
A SPECIALIST EYE TEAM
VISIT TO THE SOLOMONS
ISLANDS
Pacific eye institute outreach team: Director for the
Pacific Eye institute Dr John SZETU (in blue shirt) and
his team: Front row -Dr Rabebe Tekeraoi [Kiribati]; Dr
Mandeep Kaur [Fiji]; Back row -Sr. Konio Szetu [PNG];
RN Ashreeta Lingam [Fiji]; RN Rachael Sorumana
[Solomons]; RN Dustin Alubaea [Solomons].
In response to a request by the Pacific Eye Institute
for funding support for a number of its outreach
visits, SSCSIP will be funding a trip to the Solomon
Islands at the end of May. The purpose of the visit is
to provide free specialist eye care services to Solomon
Islands. Approximately 1,000 patient consultations,
this means that approximately 70-100 eye surgeries
per hospital. The team membership will consist of the
Pacific Eye Institute consultants and trainee Pacific
Island ophthalmologists and ophthalmic nurses. The
SSCSIP will be supporting airfares, equipment freight
and meal allowances
www.sscsip.org