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The Safe Blood for Africa Foundation™ is making a significant change in quality management systems in Cameroon
March 2019
The Safe Blood for Africa Foundation (SBFA) started a mentorship programme in July 2016 to assist the Hospital Blood Bank’s (HBB) staff in meeting the requirements of the World Health Organization (WHO) for Blood Safety and the Standards of Africa Society for Blood Transfusion (AfSBT) Stepwise Accreditation Programme focusing at Step 1 Certification. Mentorship support and side-by-side practical demonstrations were essential to ensure progress towards AfSBT accreditation and refinement of the knowledge, skills and competency acquired during in the previous training conducted in the HBB since 2012. Thanks to the SBFA mentorship, the Blood Bank of the Yaoundé Central Hospital has received AfSBT Step 1 Certification. The Step-wise Accreditation Programme certifies HBBs that demonstrate that the Blood Bank meets quality and operational requirements for Blood Safety facilities in Africa.
November 2020
The SBFA Cameroon office received ICCBBA support (https://www.isbt128.org/post/2020-enterprise-grant) toreinforce the capacity of the staff of the other HBBsof Cameroon withthe informationandskillsthatwillenabletheobjective ofdevelopinganHBB Quality Management Systemsandpermitittooperateatthelevelof internationalbestpracticefor all requirementsofthe BloodSafety ValueChain(BSVC).
A total of 18 staff from 18 blood services across the country were trained by the SBFA experts from Cameroon and South Africa. The participants were technologists, master degree in virology, master degree in immunology, master degree in haematology and pharmacists among others. Most of them were technologists in charge of the QMS in their facility. The primary outcome of the training was developing an appropriate Implementation Plan for a QMS in the participant’s facility and these are being followed-up.
July 2021
The SBFA Cameroon office has received another ICCBBA support grant to reinforce the quality management system of the Yaoundé University Teaching Hospital Blood Service through the installation of a comprehensive data management and labelling system using the Blood Safety Information System (BSIS – developed with support from SBFA and CDC USA), the AfSBT Stepwise Accreditation, and the ISBT 128 recommendations as a framework. The SBFA intends to install a hardware system, the Jembi Health System BSIS software,the AfSBT Standards derived SOPs, and to appropriately train and mentor the staff.
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Training of the Cameroon Quality Managers, November 2020 |
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Training of the Cameroon Quality Managers, November 2020 |
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