Building digital health capacity in Africa

The session will present the Digital Health Leadership Program of the African Alliance of digital health networks. The Digital Health Leadership Program is designed to help develop the technical capacity in African digital health leaders, particularly in government agencies, to develop, manage, and direc initiatives and investments. The specific objectives of the program are to: • Facilitate in-country personnel to receive certification training. • Establish a mentorship program that supports the graduates from the certification programs to apply the knowledge acquired in-country. • Establish a peer network that enables peer learning, support, and information exchange. • Provide technical assistance and on-the-job training (through the mentors). Expected outcomes of the program include: • Improvements in management of in-country digital health initiatives. • Increased confidence of the in-country digital health leaders in the program as they are supported by both mentors and peers. • Improvements in the execution of on-the-job activities and decisions of participants as learnings are applied. The program will achieve these objectives by supporting successful applicants to undertake and acquire world-class certifications in fields relevant to digital health (such as project management, governance etc.), providing mentorship and support to participants through a robust mentor faculty, peer-to-peer support through a community of practice, and immediate application of the learnings on the job. While didactic methods such as traditional classroom training are still necessary to convey theory and complex information, the repeated interactions with mentors and peers will reinforce t the training on the job enables “book knowledge” to become real-world experience and skill.