Kate Woodhead RGN DMS shares her reflections on 25 years of delivering perioperative education through the charity, Friends of African Nursing. She provides an insight into the lessons learnt, the impact achieved and challenges encountered along the way.
Friends of African Nursing is a small UK based charity which delivers perioperative education in a variety of different African countries. The charity has run programmes in Kenya, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Zambia, Kenya, Ghana, The Seychelles, Malawi, Rwanda, Botswana and Lesotho. We began our teaching in Uganda in 2001 and are hoping to return in 2026. Most of the students we have taught are practicing theatre staff who have not had opportunities for education on their specialised subject. There is little available on the continent. This is the gap which we filled and each of the facilitators who have accompanied us have been experienced perioperative nurses, comfortable with passing on their skills and wisdom. We have strived to make our courses effective and impactful; they evaluate well. Our vision is of an African network of nursing professionals, trained to excellence, able to apply their knowledge to safe patient care in the Operating Theatre.
As our 25th anniversary is upon us, we should reflect on the strategies that have kept us going and some of the skills which we have, or have developed, to shape our understanding of life in well resourced healthcare systems and those less fortunate. There are lessons to learn from each other, which benefits both sides. We have a raft of exciting events planned during the year, not only to celebrate our longevity but also to ensure that there is resilience for the future. We want to feel the success of our achievements and ensure that future students are able to benefit.
To date, we have educated nearly 4,000 nurses and others face to face or on-line (which was our response to the COVID crisis). From an educator's perspective, I prefer by far the face-to-face experience and think that it is much richer for both the student and the teacher. You can see the response on a face, know if the student has grasped the concept or understood the language you have used. I remember in one country using the phrase 'reach for the stars' and while their English was good, there was bewilderment on the faces of several in the room. They did not get it, so an immediate response was easy — change the phrase. An on-line delivery would not enable this change unless someone writes a note to ask you what you were talking about! However, the success of on-line was that we could appeal to many different countries and reach many more students at once.
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