The Union Zimbabwe Office conducted its first National Training of Trainers on Programmatic Management of Drug-Resistant Tuberculosis Course for health workers on 14–18 January in Bulwayo. The course objective was to enable healthcare workers to detect cases of DR-TB, manage patients with DR-TB at provincial, district and primary health care levels – and ultimately lead training sessions themselves.
The 22 participants from the country's 8 provinces and 3 cities included nurses, doctors, provincial managers, laboratory and pharmacy personnel from provincial and district healthcare levels, members of the uniformed forces, health workers from central hospitals and partner organisations. The curriculum for the 5-day course was adapted from PMDT training materials developed by the World Health Organisation (WHO).
In the next few months, those trained at the first session will conduct 2 regional Programmatic Management of Drug-Resistant Tuberculosis Courses and 10 provincial training sessions. The provincial trainers will then cascade the training to the districts with the goal of identifying more patients with drug-resistant tuberculosis.
Funding for the training has been provided by the TB CARE I programme coordinated by The Union Zimbabwe Office in Harare.