Summary:
Brief Background:
Master of ceremony Dr. Simran Shrestha started the proceedings of the webinar by introducing the speaker Dr. Shambhu Acharya and the moderator Dr. Suman Lohani.
Dr. Acharya is currently working as a director, strategic division, in WHO, Geneva, Switzerland. He has completed Masters of Arts in Sociology, Master of Business Administration in Public Finances and PhD in Public Health. He has more than twenty-five years of experiences in policy and strategy development and analysis, policy dialogue, technical advice and program management support to countries and WHO country offices. He has published several articles on policy analysis, management and health and development in regional and international journals.
Dr. Lohani is a recent MD graduate in Community Medicine and Tropical Diseases from BPKIHS, Dharan. She has actively participated as a resource person to the training course on service provider on PEN. She has completed Master Training of Trainers for International Classification of Diseases.
Dr. Acharya started the presentation by explaining what public health actually deals with. He shared an idea to focus on grabbing the opportunities to build our skills and competencies on the area that are in demand. He stated various opportunities for Public Health professionals both Nationally and Internationally such as NGO’s, INGO’s, bilateral and multilateral agencies.
He also mentioned that on the basis of our skills we can indulge our self on various fields like Maternal and Child Health, Healthy Behavior and Health Promotion, Water and Sanitation, Population and Democracy.
The webinar lasted for one hour and fifteen minutes. On behalf of the NESCOM, a certificate of appreciation was presented following the insightful presentation by Dr. Acharya. Around 100 participants were presented during the webinar. The webinar ended with the concluding remarks by Dr. Surya Bahadur Parajuli along with the announcement of the upcoming NESCOM webinar on “Rural health care in Nepal”.
Objectives:
- To know opportunities for a public health professional nationally and internationally
- To know the skills required to become a potential candidate for recognizable position
Key points that came up during discussion:
- We should focus on how we can build our skills and competencies on the areas of demand
- Years of experiences in the national level is required to get opportunities at the international level
- Documentation of the work and building networks for the dissemination of the work is very important. Annual awareness program held globally are another hub for networking and opportunities
- Hard work with no disappointment after rejection is the key to success
- Communication skills also plays a significant role specially speaking which should be clear, convincible and understandable
Policy brief:
- Coordination with various national and international agencies to strengthen the network is needed to recognize public health professionals at the global level. Development of the education system focusing in building the practical knowledge and skills is need of an hour and should be focused
Point to be discussed in Executive Committee:
- Role of Nepalese Society of Community Medicine (NESCOM) in providing the opportunities for public health professionals
Conclusion:
There are various opportunities for public health professionals around the world but the only thing is we need to recognize those opportunities, grab it and keep on exploring on the areas of focus to build our skills and competency. There is land of opportunities if we explore socially and through mass media especially updating our knowledge through recent updates from internet rather than sticking only to our books.