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CAPACITY DEVELOPMENT FOR INFECTIOUS DISEASE CONTROL IN AUSTRALIA AND THE REGION

The MAE Program
The Master of Applied Epidemiology Program (MAE) was established at NCEPH in 1991 in partnership with national and state/territory governments to strengthen our capacity to control communicable diseases. Outcomes of the program have included development of the workforce, of systems for surveillance and response, and of studies that informed development of policies and programs at the local, state/territory, national and international levels.

The MAE program also collaborates with international partners in capacity development initiatives such as training in applied epidemiology, development of public health systems, and the establishment and evaluation of surveillance and response programs. Our international partners include health ministries in Asian countries (e.g. in Cambodia, China, India, Laos, Malaysia and Vietnam ), Pacific Island nations, and technical and donor agencies such as AusAID, WHO, the Asian Development Bank, ASEAN and the Secretariat of the Pacific Community.

The need for conceptual models of capacity development
We define capacity development as a dynamic and continuous process to strengthen the ability of organizations to enhance health services, and more generally, the performance of the health system. It is essentially an internal process and can be enhanced through external support. However, there is little consensus on the elements of development critical for enabling as well as evaluating performance outcomes and sustainability.

From a systems perspective, capacity development can be perceived as a complex intervention. The intervention has many components and requires multiple relatively independent but interacting stakeholders, often with different and competing interests. They have the freedom to act in ways that are not always predictable, and their actions are interconnected so that one agent's action changes the context for other agents through non-linear feedback loops. Consequently, small changes in one component may have striking effects on a given outcome that cannot be understood by analysing only the individual components.

Developing models of capacity development
Based on our ongoing experiences, we are developing and refining conceptual models to explore and better understand the pathways and mechanisms for achieving specified capacity development outcomes, and to define a hierarchy of needs and the elements critical to performance in a given context. These models will help us refine tools used to drive the process of capacity development, including problem diagnosis, project design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation, and sustainability.

Contact: Mahomed Patel