Is AGM report seen as significant in African Health Institution

By Mercy Adede Bolus

Annual General Meeting (AGM) report is an opportunity for any established hospital to proudly share the progress and set backs of its organization with its stakeholders. This helps the stakeholders to have an insight of the progress and milestones of the institution.

It is the responsibility of the stakeholders to be interested in the background of a hospital particularly when making choices of from the service user point of view. For example in terms of the the vision of the institution,it's values, services and staff. In addition, know about what the principal activities are as well as the success rate of operations. In most African countries AGM happens behind closed doors and AGM reports are not routinely shared with the stakeholders. As a result they are unable to challenge clinical operations and the financial health of the institution. Some senior Doctors often feels they should be challenged and the practice sometimes goes unchallenged. However new Government are beginning to challenge the system and more and more hospitals are being hold to account.

It appears most hospitals and health clinics in Africa have not embedded information technology in business processes.

The dynamics of information has not fully been exploited to benefit the delivery of health care services in many African countries. Information technology is still slow. In Ghana for example, although the major hospitals may have information technology embedded into its business process and satellite clinic and health post do and resources with the larger hospitals when there is no information to compare electronically. The Scandinavians started using the information technology to enhance their service delivery back in 1980's.

By 2010 most National Health Service in the U.K also followed to improve outcomes. In contrast, in the business world, information technology has been always been exploited, manipulated and mined. They appraise each others AGM reports covertly. This has helped businesses to appraise their competitors' capability by gaining an insight of their business with the mission of not only gaining a competitive advantage but also strategic positioning.

Interestingly, in many African National Health Service, like Ghana, information technology is not viewed in the same light as business activity. This is where directors, performance evaluation, arrangement and financial review are critical to the success of a company. Businesses review main trends and factors that is more likely to affect the future development and social community. Instead AGM do not happen or if it does some behind closed doors. The general public can not easily access AGM report. It rather limits the way AGM reports could be exploited in many African countries to help improve services across countries remotely to appraise performance of procedures.

In the light of Ebola crisis hard lessons were learnt. It would help if African hospitals learn to share AGM reports to wider stakeholders and be more open about clinical governance. This is because the Ebola crisis became a global crisis. Having AGM reports which could be accessed on line could have helped well institution willing to help countries affected by accessing reports and other information remotely. This would critical strategic planning of operations before resources are physically sent out there.

Surely having AGM annual helps any health institution and its stakeholders to have in-depth knowledge about services, staff performances, skills or skill deficit. This information would not only help in strategic planning of resource allocation but also evaluate service delivery.

Staff Staff in many African hospitals do not have the basic equipment for tackling infection control. This is what transpired when the we had the Ebola outbreak. There seems to be no regular update on compliance as compared to what is seen in a developed country with mandatory training requirements. If health institutions in the developing countries can not share its AGM reports online how could developed countries step in to offer a assistance. This could be the deciding factor which would determine if a country is likely to be the next Ebola victim or other health crisis.

How could the National Health Service in Africa countries boost its image and profile. Surely if globally every health institution is working towards the targets set by the World Health Organization on health improvement and developments then we need to share best practice and cost of effectiveness of approaches.

Having a Patient survey in African hospitals re the following would be helpful tool to use.

Are hospitals performance rating done quarterly?

Is there an ongoing clinical governance to review performance rating ?

Do patients have a voice in the decision making process in Africa via AGM?

Does hospitals provide useful contacts for it patients for complaints?

Is there a patient advise service and public involvement in African hospitals

Staff survey

How does hospital staff feel in term of career development and progression?

Is the financial summary disclosed in the annual report?

Are the staff encouraged to attend hospital AGM and therefore know the names of the board of executives?

It is believed that in some African hospitals the stakeholders are navigating progress of their hospital in the dark when they come to performances ratings. There is hardly any information for them to either get online or via hospital website. Information could be covered up to avoid any embarrassment/ bad practice etc.

Many African Governments are not bold enough to hold the heads of all hospital institutions to accounts. As result huge sums of money is lost through the rather weak system which has given rise to corruption have taken over in all health institutions in Africa.

The effective strategic management of the Ebola crisis proved that the developed countries and developing countries to work together to form a health alliance to address future challenges.

A recommendation for the way forward on health issues would be for African countries to share their AGM reports online if possible. The report would htne help other stakeholders to analyze and exploit information which could benefit both institution for future development and progress. Health problems is a global issue. Evidence and interventions of the Ebola crisis proved that a global management of the approach certainly help in containing and preventing the spread on a global scale.