CONTENTS
Chapters
- Thirty Years of Family Planning Programs
- Family Planning Demand
- Contraceptive Access
- Choice of Contraceptive Methods
- Client-Centered Quality
- Communication
- Well-Trained Providers
- Program Leadership and Strategic Management
- Research and Evaluation
- Political Commitment
- Financial Resources
Population Reports is published by the Population Information Program, Center for Communication Programs, The
Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, 111 Market Place, Suite 310, Baltimore, Maryland
21202-4012, USA
Volume XXII, Number 2
August, 1994 |
Training Improves Quality
Programs that offer high-quality services use training to
motivate providers and build their counseling and interpersonal
communication skills (118). A conference on family planning
counseling held in Istanbul in 1992, sponsored by AVSC
International and attended by representatives of 25 countries,
recommended that, to improve the quality of care through better
training:
- Family planning counseling should become part of medical and nursing school curricula;
- Interpersonal communication skills should be incorporated into on-the-job training for all health
workers and volunteers;
- Staff members with formal training in counseling should be given responsibility for providing on-the-job
orientation of other staff members (3).
On-site training in counseling should be offered because
service providers come to their jobs with widely different
personal characteristics, attitudes, and expectations that affect
their ability to provide care (70). On-site training helps
providers to become aware of their own biases and to respect the
client's interests and needs (31). Such training also can
promulgate a procedure for counseling, such as the GATHER
approach (98), that is flexible enough to meet individual needs
but also provides a standard for high-quality care.
Increasingly, family planning programs recognize the
importance of training to empower staff members, improve morale
and interpersonal skills, and offer exposure to new ideas. For
example, in 1988 Ogun State, Nigeria, began short-term training
in counseling skills as part of the family planning certification
curriculum for nurses (86). In 1991 Ain Shams University in Egypt
created a specialty in family planning, apart from the regular
ob-gyn program, so that family planning service providers would
be better motivated and have a better professional image. About
40 service providers received the degree in the first two years
(216). Also, Turkey is now incorporating counseling training into
the medical school curriculum (3). |
