The rapidly growing burden of different diseases, healthcare deficiencies, economical and political challenges demand changes in complex public health system in Democratic Republic of Congo. Inadequate infrastructure and staffing are emphasized as the main challenge that prevents successful integration of treatment and prevention services in resource-constrained Republic of Congo.

Public health in Democratic Republic of Congo

Struggle for medical needs is enormous in Democratic Republic of Congo with limited access to most basic level of healthcare services. In spite of efforts to improve healthcare in Democratic Republic of Congo, the healthcare system in the country remains in poor state with virtually non-existent healthcare facilities in rural areas. Decades of neglect in health system of Democratic Republic of Congo has resulted in lowering life expectancy, increasing infant and maternal mortality rate. The dysfunctional Immunization program and lack of sustained vaccination strategies has created a permanent health emergency in the country. Preventable epidemics of malaria, cholera and measles have taken a heavy toll on the Congolese population. In Democratic Republic of Congo, medical emergency event calls for external medical repatriation and management of patient healthis associated with several therapeutic or diagnostic challenges.
The desperate state of public healthcare system in Democratic Republic of Congo, disrepair in terms of health facilities and services, inadequately trained staff, lack of well-stocked pharmacies and poor provisions for health insurance needs attention. Emergency financial support and humanitarian response would contribute to increase systems resilience and strengthen the ongoing development work through a parallel health service delivery system. It is vital that experts and healthcare providers be trained with knowledge of recent guidelines; define rates of morbidity and mortality; monitor prevalence of non-communicable, infectious ortropical diseases; develop tailored generic health services or programs based on operational feasibility and availability of resources in Republic of Congo.Aligning or integrating treatment and preventive services through coordinated and collaborative effortswith research and training activities can bridge the gaps in functional, structural or operational resource factors.

Public health Infrastructure

Healthcare services face significant resource and operational challenges of limited staffing, crowded health facilities, limiteddiagnostic methods and poor infrastructural resources. Countrys enormous size, poorly trained health workers and lack of investment in healthcare facilities cause logistical constraints and lead to weak national disease treatment and prevention measures. Lack of investment in healthcare system results in poorly trained medical staff and infrastructure throughout the country that prevents control of epidemics and treatment of neglected deadly diseases. Three major weakness points identified to affect the implementation of an effectiveprogram are lack of coordination, improper surveillance studies and unspecified plan of action.
Workable and feasible strategy needs to be developed to overcome several important infrastructure bottlenecks in healthcare system of Republic of Congo. Developing electronic monitoring database, establishing quality integration and implementation of health services will address several priority areas such as low rates of screening andtesting diseases, insufficient referral of patients for treatments and ongoing mortality rates due to diseases. National disease control programs needs to be created independently in terms of logistics, human resources or finance management and allocation. The health system in Republic of Congo could improve by applyingearly diagnostic techniqueand rapid initiation of treatment as key strategies in disease control. A major obstacle is the lack of rapid diagnostic technique that is easy to use, cheap, sensitive and rapid method to detect diseases in Republic of Congo needs to be made available.

Public Health Online Course at JLI

James Lind Institute (JLI) provides an online Masters in Public Health (MPH) in collaboration with International Telematic University UNINETTUNO. JLI also provides online courses in healthcare management, tropical medicine, global health, sexual and reproductive health and clinical research studies.
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