Optimal control and cost-effectiveness analysis of age-structured malaria model with asymptomatic carrier and temperature variability.

This paper presents an age-structured mathematical model for malaria transmission dynamics with asymptomatic carrier and temperature variability. The temperature variability function is fitted to the temperature data, and the malaria model is then fitted to the malaria cases and validated to check its suitability. Time-dependent controls were considered, including Long Lasting Insecticide Nets, treatment of symptomatic, screening and treatment of asymptomatic carriers and spray of insecticides.

A qualitative study of fourteen African countries' nursing workforce and labour market.

Aim: The aim of this study was to describe factors affecting nursing education and labour markets in countries in East, Central, and Southern Africa, and critical areas for investment.

Background: An understanding about the relationship between the supply of nurses (determined by types of educational programmes, and the quantity and quality of nurse graduates), and workforce demand is critical to health policy development.

Methods: Six focus groups and 14 key informant interviews with nursing leaders and experts were conducted.

Adaptation of the Training Resource Package to Strengthen Preservice Family Planning Training for Nurses and Midwives in Tanzania and Uganda.

Background: Tanzania and Uganda have high total fertility and maternal mortality rates, and low contraceptive prevalence rates. High-quality preservice family planning education for nurses and midwives can improve the quality of sexual and reproductive health care, thereby improving health outcomes.

Description Of Intervention: In 2015, we worked with relevant stakeholders in Tanzania and Uganda through a series of surveys, assessments, and workshops to adapt modules of the Training Resource Package for Family Planning (TRP), an evidence-based global resource, to improve the quality of preservice family planning education for nurses and midwives.

Evaluation of the impact of the ARC program on national nursing and midwifery regulations, leadership, and organizational capacity in East, Central, and Southern Africa.

Background: The African Health Professions Regulatory Collaborative (ARC) was launched in 2011 to support countries in East, Central, and Southern Africa to safely and sustainably expand HIV service delivery by nurses and midwives. While the World Health Organization recommended nurse initiated and managed antiretroviral therapy, many countries in this region had not updated their national regulations to ensure nurses and midwives were authorized and trained to provide essential HIV services. For four years, ARC awarded annual grants, convened regional meetings, and provided technical assistance to country teams of nursing and midwifery leaders to improve national regulations related to safe HIV service delivery.

Establishing an Online Continuing and Professional Development Library for Nurses and Midwives in East, Central, and Southern Africa.

Over the past 4 years, the African Health Profession Regulatory Collaborative for nurses and midwives has supported 12 countries establish national continuing and professional development frameworks and programs, linking continuing education to nursing and midwifery re-licensure through technical assistance and improvement grants. However, lack of electronic media and rural practice sites, differences in priority content, and varying legal frameworks make providing accessible, certifiable, and up-to-date online continuing education content for the more than 300,000 nurses and midwives in the 17 member countries of the East, Central, and Southern Africa College of Nursing a major challenge. We report here on how the East, Central, and Southern Africa College of Nursing, with technical assistance from an Afya Bora Fellow, developed an online continuing professional development library hosted on their Web site using data collected in a survey of nursing and midwifery leaders in the region.