Summary
Date Posted: Tuesday, October 12, 2021 , Base Salary: Not Disclosed

JOB DETAILS:
The RCSI/COSECSA Collaboration Programme (CP) is a partnership between COSECSA (the
College of Surgeons of East, Central and Southern Africa) and RCSI (the Royal College of
Surgeons in Ireland). Its objective is to achieve better-quality surgical care for more patients in
sub-Saharan Africa. The CP is funded by the Irish government’s overseas aid programme, Irish
Aid, and receives in-kind support from RCSI. It is now entering its 14th year.
Over that time, the CP has grown to become one of the largest surgical training partnerships in
the world through its capacity building, “whole-college” approach. Through the CP, both Colleges
have contributed to the academic literature and advocacy around global surgery. In 2019, the
CP began working with CANECSA (the College of Anaesthetists of East, Central and Southern
Africa) and CAI (the College of Anaesthesiologists of Ireland) to simultaneously build the
anaesthesia workforce in sub-Saharan Africa.

The CP has one full-time staff member, the Programme Manager, based at RCSI in Ireland, and
leverages the resources and expertise of RCSI, including project management support in order to
deliver its objective.
For the next four years (2021-2024), the CP has three goals:
• Goal 1: Support practicing surgeons and anaesthesiologists to deliver high quality care to
patients, promote quality improvement in surgical services and ensure that trainees
receive high-quality training
• Goal 2: Increase the organisational capacity of African-led partners to deliver training, to
contribute to national and regional health policies, and to participate in international
advocacy
• Goal 3: Contribute relevant, evidence-based studies on surgical training, workforce and
practice in sub-Saharan Africa to the scientific literature and global surgery community

Duties and Responsibilities:
The Research and Patient Outcomes Coordinator will support the Programme Manager in the
delivery of the CP as well as actively contributing to the development of the IGS. The post will be
based in Arusha, Tanzania but will involve some travel to other countries in East, Central and
Southern Africa, as well as to Ireland, once travel resumes safely.
Specifically, the Research and Patient Outcomes Coordinator will have responsibility for the
hands-on management of specific project activities of the CP three goals.

. Research coordination:
• Increasing the global research output of the RCSI/COSECSA Collaboration Programme
• Establishing and supporting small groups of RCSI and COSECSA and/or CANECSA
(College of Anaesthetists of East, Central and Southern Africa) students/trainees/Fellows
to co-author global surgery studies on behalf of the CP, with focus on patient impact
• Contributing to research studies where necessary
• Supporting COSECSA’s IRB and Data Governance Group to develop their protocols,
procedures and infrastructure
• Supporting the COSECSA journal to increase readership and gain PubMed indexing
• Develop and present research proposals to a relevant technical team of RCSI/COSECSA
for discussion and endorsement
• Contribute to identification of topical research issues with regional focus on surgery and
anaesthesiology
• Supporting the identification of audit needs and a framework for regional audits in
COSECSA-accredited hospitals
• Generation of evidence-based policy analysis and advocacy messaging for COSECSA,
CP and IGS
• Enabling COSECSA to engage effectively with governments and ministries in the region
through providing supporting impact data, at country and regional level
• Develop information exchange and experience sharing platforms among Surgeons and
Anaesthesiologists in Member States on aspects of the quality of surgical care to the
Patient

Deriving insight from data:
• Ensuring that relevant insights gained from research and from data are fed back into
improving this CP
• Ensure the institutional policy issues are incorporated in the CP for decision making

Liaising with allied health professions:
• With Nursing partners to support training of Intensive Care and OT nurses in sub-Saharan
Africa
• With Ob/Gyn partners to promote better surgical care to women and girls in sub-Saharan
Africa
• With partners to promote better quality surgical care to patients with surgical diseases
• With partners to promote better quality care to rurally-based patients

. Qualifications:
• Successful candidates must possess a postgraduate or higher qualification (PhD or Masters
Degree) in Global Health, Global Surgery, Public Health. A related field is preferred or
equivalent combination of education and experience.
• Academic publications in global surgery/global health or related field

. Knowledge & Experience – Essential:
• 2-4 years’ experience of conducting clinical research in health/education fields in subSaharan Africa
• Familiarity with community research-based principles.
• Minimum two-four years’ experience in program coordination, volunteer management in a
health related, adult education or frontline client service
• Experience with hospital or health service audits
• Certification on ethical conduct of research and data access protocols
• Experience managing multiple projects simultaneously
• Experience in data management and analysis
• Familiar with gender and social inclusion issues
• A highly motivated self-starter
. Skills & Competencies – Essential:
• Strong project management skills
• Excellent interpersonal skills and cross-cultural skills
• Ability to develop and manage relationships remotely with multiple stakeholders, both internal
and external
• Ability to work successfully with colleagues from different professional backgrounds with
different skillsets
• Ability to work successfully with colleagues serving in an honorary or voluntary capacity
• Strong Microsoft Excel skills
• Ability to work well with minimal supervision
• Ability to analyse several information points and identify strategically favourable courses of
action
• Comfort with managing large datasets
• Ability to guide and mentor junior colleagues and researchers
. Knowledge & Experience - Desirable:
• Experience of setting up an organisational research programme
• Experience of working in capacity-building, long-term partnerships
• Experience of working with public and patient interest (PPI) in research studies
• Experience using other research software (such as SPSS, R, Redcap and Stata) and data
visualisation software (such as Power BI and Tableau).
• Familiarity with the global surgery/global health community in Sub-Saharan African and
Globally

. Skills & Competencies – Desirable:
• Aptitude for eLearning, data analytics, simulation technology for medical education,
information systems, tech innovations, information management

• Aptitude for communications and public engagement on project and research impact

Work Hours: 8

Experience in Months: 24

Level of Education: Postgraduate Degree

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Job application procedure

Applications should reach the address below by 30th September 2021.
The Director General
East, Central and Southern Africa-Health Community
Plot 157 Oloirien, Njiro Road
P.O. Box 1009, Arusha, Tanzania

E-mail: vacancies@ecsahc.org  with copies to regsec@ecsahc.org;  doid@ecsahc.org; 
Website: www.ecsahc.org 

ECSA-HC is an equal opportunity employer, and female candidates are encouraged to apply.
For further information please visit our website: www.ecsahc.org 


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