National Coordinator at Treat the Pain Nigeria

Treat the Pain is an international program within the American Cancer Society (ACS) to improve access to essential pain medicines. The program provides technical support to improve patient access to opioid analgesics, with a focus on low and middle-income countries with high unmet need for pain relief.

Treat the Pain established a partnership with the Federal Ministry of Health (FMOH) in Nigeria in 2012 that has resulted in improved availability of essential pain medicines in the nation’s teaching hospitals.

Now that there is a sufficient supply of morphine, the American Cancer Society and the Federal Ministry of Health would like to focus on training doctors, nurses, and pharmacists to assess pain and offer high-quality treatment to patients. Decades of underuse have resulted in a lack of awareness and training in the use of these essential pain medicines, and this new initiative seeks to improve the ability of health workers to provide high-quality pain treatment.

Treat the Pain is an international program within the American Cancer Society (ACS) to improve access to essential pain medicines, we are currently recruiting to fill the position of:

Job Title: National Coordinator for the Pain-Free Hospital Initiative in Nigeria

Location: Nigeria

Job Description
The Pain-Free Hospital Initiative (PFHI) is a one-year hospital-wide quality improvement initiative to integrate pain treatment into service delivery by providing education for patients and staff, raising motivation and awareness among hospital staff, measuring and documenting pain levels, and improving medicine supply.

The project has four components:
Motivate: Share patients’ stories to motivate health workers. Conduct periodic surveys of clinical knowledge and skillsto allow health workers to track their own improvement.

• Supply: Ensure that essential pain medicines are available at all times.
• Equip: Deliver medical education programs and reference materials to improve health workers skills in treating pain.
• Measure: Document patient pain scores in the medical chart and periodically conduct pain surveys to measure the average pain score of patients in a ward.
• The National Coordinator will support and report to the Treat the Pain Consultant to Director of Food and Drug Services at the Federal Ministry of Health to implement Pain-Free Hospital Initiative.

Major Responsibilities
Issue a Request for Applications:

• The coordinator will work with the FMOH to issue a request for applications (RFA).
• The request for applications will be issued through the Food and Drug Services Department to the chief medical officers of up to 32 teaching hospitals. Following issuance of the RFA, the coordinator will support interested hospitals in completing their applications before the application deadline has passed.

Administrative set-up:
Once hospitals have been selected, the coordinator will:

• Assist partner hospitals in completing a grant agreement with the American Cancer Society
• Confirm thatthe hospital finance department has been notified of the grant agreement
• Monitor the grant payment tothe hospital
• Confirm that a staff champion and administrative staff have been selected with approval frpm the chief medical officer
• Ensure that all program supplies have been received and correctly packaged in Nigeria
• Deliver the program supplies to the staff champions at partner hospitals
• Resolve anydelays that arise in the administrative set-up process.

Motivate: The coordinator will review the proposed motivational activities at the hospital, make sure that the necessary materials are available, and follow up to confirm that the activities have been implemented as proposed.

Equip: The coordinator will support the staff champion as necessary in adapting training slides, organizing training sessions, procuring vendor quotes for food during the training sessions, and other related activities.

Supply: The coordinator will review monthly opioid consumption data at each hospital to ensure that stock levels are replenished before hospitals exhaust their stocks.

Measure: The coordinator will assist the program staff in conducting data gathering exercises specifically, the quarterly physician knowledge survey, and monthly opiold consumption and pain assessments and in reporting data to Treatthe Pain in a timely fashion.

Communicate: The coordinator will visit each hospital at least once each quarter to monitor and support the program. In the pilot phase, the coordinator will make more frequent visits to ensure the smooth implementation. The coordinator will work with the staff champion to resolve any minor challenges that arise, and escalate major issues to Treat the Pain. The coordinator will ensure that the interim and final narrative reports are completed by the hospital in a timely fashion (as directed in the grant agreement)

Knowledge

• Understanding of and experience with public health management
• Working knowledge of the functioning of federal governmental structures
• Training and qualification in palliative care and project management

Skills and Qualification

• University degree in medicine, nursing, pharmacyorother social fields
• Not lessthan three yearsof progressively professional experience
• Ability to grasp new things and work independently
• Excellent communications, analytical and business development skills
• Excellent ability to communicate across cultures and in different environments nonprofit, government and business
• Expertise in the use of basic computer applications, including Microsoft Word and PowerPoint
• Ability to communicate effectively, both orally and in writing
• Excellent consulting and communication skills

Application Closing Date
30th June, 2014

How to Apply
lnterested candidates should send a curriculum vitae (CV) and cover letter to: [email protected] before 30th June, 2014.

Note: That only short-listed candidates will be considered. No telephone calls, please.