An inception workshop was held recently in the Serena Hotel in Dushanbe, Tajikistan for the KfW-funded ‘Mother and Child/Emergency Phase II-IV’ project in Tajikistan supporting the Ministry of Health and Social Protection of Population (MoHSPP) in the implementation of mother and child health /emergency care services. In attendance were the representatives of the MoHSPP, the chief doctors of the eleven programme hospitals, representatives of the German Embassy, KfW and other international development partners and the consultant’s consortium. The focus of the workshop was to introduce the project to all stakeholders.

The 6-year €5.2 M Mother and Child/Emergency project will further partial rehabilitation / partial new construction of hospitals and medical equipment recently achieved in phase I of the mother and child emergency project funded by KfW, as well as provide support to the MoHSPP in the development and implementation of rationalisation and optimisation approaches. Additionally, training measures will be developed and implemented addressing topics such as clinical issues, waste management, building and equipment maintenance, hospital management and telemedicine.

The overall objective of the project is to contribute to the improvement of the health status of the population of Tajikistan, particularly of Khatlon Oblast. The programme objective is to increase utilisation of quality healthcare services by the population, as well as improvement of the efficiency and quality of medical care and emergency treatment. This is to be reached by rehabilitating and equipping selected hospitals as well as a set of accompanying measures to sustain the investments made.