With approximately 350 health facilities offering pharmaceutical services in Namibia, capacity building and technical support for pharmacists are crucial to maintaining top-quality service provision. For many pharmacists, day-to-day business and the high number of patients leave little time for training in key areas such as medicine safety and health commodity management. But for pharmacists like Anna Naukushu, their passion for delivering excellent service drives their quest for knowledge.
As a young girl from Otaukondjele village in northern Namibia’s Ohangwena region, Anna always wanted to help those in need. “When I visited the hospital and saw all those people in pain, I vowed that one day I will be able to help,” she says. As she grew older, Anna’s interest in science became evident, leading her to pursue a Bachelor’s Degree in Clinical Pharmacy. While serving as a link between patient and cure has been her childhood dream, it also comes with challenges, and many of them are related to a consistently busy schedule serving many different kinds of people.
Today, Anna is happy and thankful to receive expert support without having to leave her workstation. To assist public pharmacies all over the country, the Ministry of Health and Social Services conducts support visits to all 14 regions of Namibia with funding from the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) through the United States Agency for International Development’s (USAID) Global Health Supply Chain Program (GHSC-PSM). The visits are led by the Ministry and typically include GHSC-PSM staff as well as senior pharmacists. The GHSC-PSM program supports countries to achieve stronger, more resilient health supply chains.
These expert visits are a testament to the importance the Ministry of Health and Social Services places on ensuring that the Namibian people receive quality medical care. The team helps pharmacists in their daily working environment which allows for case-by-case troubleshooting. While some facilities may have a problem with electronic dispensing tools, others face infrastructure or human resource challenges. Whereas one pharmacy may experience bottlenecks in processes, others struggle with communication or logistics.
For Anna, the visits made a big difference at the Rundu District Hospital where work has been very demanding. “Today I can navigate complex medication regimes, address patient concerns more easily, and cope much better with workload pressure,” she explains.
The support teams also assess performance at hospitals and primary healthcare facilities. The areas to be checked not only include warehouse and cold chain management to ensure medicines that need to be kept below a certain temperature to maintain their quality, but also quantification, inventory management, and Antiretroviral Treatment (ART) services.
For example, at Eloolo Clinic in Oshana region, the team realized that the health facility had not sent the required commodity and patient status reports. Such reporting gaps may result in ordering the wrong amount of medication needed and adversely affect the supply chain for commodities. The visiting team was able to help the clinic with the backlog and update their patient and inventory records which led to the return of 670 HIV patients into treatment.
The Ministry of Health and Social Services utilizes these visits as a key tool in further developing their policies. “They are crucial because they allow us to see the difference between what has been reported and the actual situation on the ground,” says Naita Nghishekwa, the Health Ministry’s Director of Pharmaceutical Services. She highlights that while some issues can be addressed at the facilities, there are also lessons learned that have an impact on the national level where policy recommendations are made.
Expert visits will continue to make tangible impacts in Namibia’s pharmaceutical sector by helping to improve processes. For Anna, who started her journey as a little girl fascinated by how medicines work, the support has helped her to do even more. “At the end of the day, when I am home listening to my gospel music, I know that I am providing the best possible service to my clients. So, my dream has come true,” she says with a smile.
