The HSSII project works on expanding, strengthening and improving the performance of selected health care systems through implementing a holistic quality improvement strategy that builds competency and commitment to primary health care service improvement. Elements include expanding a referral and appointment system; assisting the development and monitoring of operational plans; and ensuring supervision and performance monitoring as well as health workforce development.
The project activities focus on building political commitment and creating an enabling policy environment that supports the creation, scale-up and eventual institutionalization of key systems and processes.
HSS II also works with the Quality Directorate at the Ministry of Health to enroll health centers in the accreditation process using the collaborative improvement approach.
The Collaborative Improvement approach includes technical assistance and learning sessions, shared learning, continuous monitoring, on-site coaching and regular communication to assist health centers in achieving the Primary Health Care accreditation standards. Each Collaborative is comprised of 35 health centers and runs for an 18 month time period.
The Accreditation Collaboratives are designed to address common problems among the primary healthcare centers, and will follow a process designed to place these centers on a path of improvement. Every month, the participating centers come together, share problems, exchange ideas and generate solutions, and learn from their peers on what works better to achieve standards. These meetings serve as an opportunity to recognize each other’s achievements in addressing performance improvement issues. HSSII plays an important role in assessing the health centers participating in the collaborative to achieve standards through the HSSII cluster owners who provide technical/learning sessions and review the progress on accreditation.