Back to Annual Meeting Page		American Public Health Association 133rd Annual Meeting & Exposition December 10-14, 2005 Philadelphia, PA

Abstract #112432

Riitta-Liisa Kolehmainen-Aitken, MD, DrPH, Management Sciences for Health, 784 Memorial Drive, Cambridge, MA 02139, 617-250-9150, rlkaitken@msh.org

Issue: Mounting problems in the human capacity development (HCD) arena are threatening to crumble many HIV/AIDS-ravaged health systems. The HCD problems require urgent action that must be multisectoral and involve all significant stakeholders. Critical HCD action in an HIV/AIDS environment does not only belong to the Ministry of Health. It is also within the purview of the Ministries of Finance, Public Service and Labor, universities and other training institutions, licensing and regulatory bodies, professional associations and labor unions and the health workers and communities themselves. Furthermore, many human resource responsibilities have recently been transferred to local governments or lower level health offices through public sector and/or health reforms, making these entities HCD stakeholders, too.

Description: This paper discusses these critical HCD issues and describes a tool for guiding an integrated HCD response to HIV/AIDS Scale-up. The HCD Role Definition Tool (RDT) was developed by Management Sciences for Health as a practical and easily administered management tool that helps pinpoint the HCD functions and sub-functions over which role confusion and conflict are most pronounced.

Lessons Learned: An effective national HCD response requires integrating the individual HCD responses of each stakeholder into one coherent whole. For the HCD responses to be effective and well-integrated, they must be based on a commonly shared and clear understanding of the human resource functions over which each stakeholder has responsibility and/or authority.

Recommendations: Efforts should be made to facilitate coordination among stakeholders to strengthen the HCD arena. RDT presents one option for effectively integrating HCD objectives.

Learning Objectives:

• By the end of this presentation, participants will be able to list critical issues related to human resources management, human capacity development and HIV/AIDS

Keywords: HIV/AIDS, Policy/Policy Development

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

I wish to disclose that I have NO financial interests or other relationship with the manufactures of commercial products, suppliers of commercial services or commercial supporters.

Recorded presentation