Evaluating the performance of clinical officer anaesthetists’ curriculum from Kenya Medical Training College, Kenya

Abstract

The trend in Kenya is that the number of patients requiring safe anaesthesia services has increased along with the growth of the surgical services. The labour force remains strongly dependent on the COAs that have been trained in the Kenya Medical Training College. Physician anaesthesiologists remain in serious shortage in Kenya, as only less than 200 are available to over 50 million people. This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of the Clinical Officer Anaesthetists’ curriculum at Kenya Medical Training College. This study was anchored on the Context, Input, Process, Product model. Cross-sectional design was used, which allowed use of both qualitative and quantitative methods. Level five hospitals were selected as the study area. The census method was used for clinical officer anaesthetics (140), and seven anaesthesiologists were interviewed. Questionnaires and interview guides were used for data collection. The Statistical Package for Social Sciences aided data analysis. Qualitative data was coded and reported in narration and verbatim. Strict ethical guidelines were followed in this study. Findings of this study reveal that the perceptions of Clinical Officer Anaesthetists (COAs) trained by KMTC are typically seen as competent, with the mean scores in all domains being 3.63 to 3.72. The correlation analysis shows highly significant and strong relationships between competence in the practice of anaesthesia, effective communication and collaboration, patient outcomes from knowledge and skills and professional development and improvement (r = 0.957 to r = 0.986, p = 0.001). This study concludes that clinical officer anaesthetists trained at KMTC are competent in their practice of anaesthesia and teamwork and positively impactful on patient outcomes. Nevertheless, the possibilities of professional development are still restricted, and there is concern regarding the possibility of long-term development and preparedness foradvanced practice. It recommends that KMTC should enhance its curriculum by incorporating formal continuing professional development like regional anaesthesia, increasing exposure to more advanced anaesthetic methods, and providing more mentorship.