Do you want to be part of this exciting new project to bring affordable, quality primary healthcare to the grassroots? Have a look through the listed opportunities below and contact us if you are interested.
We employ our core staff full-time, however volunteers are indispensable for our project as anything that helps us to keep our costs down reduces the costs to our clients. We plan to steadily expand, so volunteering is a way to build a relationship with us and show what you can do in case a full-time position crops up.
You may also volunteer just to be of help, and to enable us to provide a service that we otherwise could not. Volunteering can be a satisfying way to fulfil your charitable aims and ensures that what you give goes direct to the beneficiary. Please read on.
We would like to hear from the following professionals:
Non-medical
NB: Nigerian Healthcare professionals abroad
Do you have help you can offer online? See our section below on our telemedicine plans.
Do you come to Nigeria often, or for extended periods? See our section below on special clinics.
The use of telemedicine, eHealth and mHealth technology will enable us to benefit from expertise that may not be available locally. Whether in Nigeria or abroad, we would like to invite heath professionals to be part of our telemedicine outreach. We have ambitious plans, but our first steps will be in teleconsultations, supportive supervision, and training
Teleconsultations
Although we offer primary health care services, often we can avoid specialist referral out – and the attendant costs and delays for the patient – if we can offer our patients a consultation over a video link. In some cases (eg psychiatry, cardiology) there is a general dearth of specialists overall. We are looking for interested Nigerian specialists, at home or abroad, who can join us in piloting a teleconsultation service. NB: At the pilot phase it will be free to the patient. If and when it becomes necessary to charge, all personnel involved will be consulted. Our primary aim is to ensure it is affordable for our clients.
Supportive supervision
One of the drawbacks of having so few trained health professionals per capita, is that newly trained workers are often thrown in the deep end with no supervision. This results in inexperienced workers being unable to benefit from the necessary on-the-job training. Their clinical skills deteriorate instead of improving as they are not exposed to best practices or able keep up with rapid changes and advances.
To ensure that we keep to our aim of providing quality care, we plan to assemble a group of experienced Nigerian practitioners (Home or abroad) for supportive supervision. This will have two main components 1) review clinic case-notes and give feedback or 2) Run case-review meetings at intervals to provide feedback and training for our staff.
Training
Our quality aims revolve around our staff. They are the most important component of healthcare delivery and training must be constant to continuously develop their skills. Our needs will continue to expand and we want our staff to be multi-skilled and have a broad understanding of the delivery of services at the primary care level.
Our training needs are wide; from teaching about proper ‘bedside manner’ to CPR, from diabetes to mental health topics, from administration to surgical techniques, we value input even if it is to be one-off. Do you already train? Can you teach online? We want to train our staff and also train the trainers.
If you have an hour or two to pare per month and you can help us train online (or in person), we would love to hear from you.
Special Clinics
For non-acute and less common problems that need specialist attention, PDQ wishes to run special clinics where patients can access specialist attention at our canters. Patients with lumps and bumps, certain skin conditions, eye or hearing problems, musculoskeletal issues etc. If you can give a few hours of your time either one-off or at intervals please do get in touch.
Feel free to visit during normal business hours.