2023 Partnering for Life Conference- Preparing for a Lifetime of Quality and Compassionate Care

This year’s conference was once again at the Coconut Grove Hotel from October 16th to the 18th. The purpose of “The Partnering for Life Conference” is to empower doctors and nurses who are at the early stages of their careers, through medical education to provide better care to their patients. The goal is also to encourage them to impact their respective hospitals and their industry as a whole as they transition into leadership roles over time.

The 2023 conference was also dedicated to the memory of Tom Petersen, our dear friend and board member who was a very integral part in making this conference happen year in and year out. His insight, generosity and commitment to serve West Africa and especially the people of Ghana through improving their healthcare, will be deeply missed.

The conference was an outstanding success not only in terms of participants but also in the number of faculty that volunteered their time and resources to make it out to Elmina to impart knowledge and build relationships. We were able to host 85 young health professionals inclusive of 29 new physicians, 23 new nurses, 6 new other allied-health, and 27 alumni participants. Thank you to all the faculty members who helped this conference achieve its goals.

Conference Impact on attendees and communities served
The feedback given at the end of the conference by the physicians and nurses who attended is giving us some true insight into the continued impact of the conference in the health care delivery in the communities the attendees came from.

• 100% of those who came to the conference said they would recommend this conference to friends and colleagues. This has already been proven as most of those who participated this year, said that an alumni of the conference had strongly recommended that they attend.
• High Quality, useful, inspirational, were some of the words a very high percentage used to describe the conference, though some also said it was too short. Clearly they rated the conference very highly and 100 % said the conference more than met their needs and they would most likely attend in future years.
• All of the physicians and nurses felt that the Basic Life Support training increased their comfort level significantly in terms caring for people with cardiac arrest of breathing problems.
• The viewpoint was the same in terms of the “Helping Babies Breathe “ training impact on their comfort level in terms of caring for newborns that may need special support.
• In a similar vein of those that attended the Obstetrical Emergencies session, all of them agreed that it increased their comfort level for caring for women with common Obstetrical emergencies.

Since a key part of our mission is to “reduce needless death in Africa”, it was great to get the strong feedback that the physicians and nurses felt better equipped to tackle the situations that often led to deaths that could be prevented.

To better highlight the impact in health care delivery to the communities served we would like to share a few of the responses given by the alumni to the question on how skills and knowledge gained from prior conferences had influenced and changed their practice prior to coming to the conference this year. All of them were very impactful and insightful, though for the sake of brevity, we couldn’t include them all.

• “The Basic Life Support training enabled me to resuscitate patients who suddenly collapsed before referring those who needed admission to the health center where I work.”
• “The ultrasound training has empowered me to practice with confidence and use the device that we have at our facility. I’m grateful for the fundamentals in using this.”
• “The leadership session last year taught me about my strengths and weaknesses and those of my colleagues. This helped me be a better leader and tap into the strengths of my colleagues. Our work environment is much better now.”
• “The ultrasound training last year helped me to diagnose a woman with respiratory distress of PE (pulmonary embolism) after I detected a clot in the deep vein using the training that i had. This led to saving her life.”
• “The sessions on patient-doctor relationship has helped me improve my interactions with patients.”
• “I learned to be more patient and make my practice patient centered.”
• “One of my take home messages was to provide compassionate care and to take care of myself as well.”
• “I’ve learnt to be more dynamic with my clients and my team at work. I’ve learnt important skills about group dynamics and how to be a good team player.”
• “Shared decision making should never be taken for granted. It is always possible to make a change in any environment no matter how small.”

The key fact is the APM Young Doctors and Nurses Conferences are making a significant difference in the communities where the attendees live and practice. Lives are being saved. The quality of care is improving. Doctors and nurses are being given valuable tools to help cope with he sheer volume of cases they see with the limited resources that they have. They are learning to continuously extend compassionate care to their patients and through shared decision-making arrive at the best possible outcome for the patient by including the patient in their own healthcare. None of this would be possible without our donors who gave so much this year to make it possible for us to have our largest conference ever. We are gaining traction in terms of health care delivery and support for the health care professionals.

THANK YOU to all those who have given so generously of their resources and time to fund this outreach. You are saving lives and making a huge difference in terms of patient experience at the hospitals the attendees came from.