[Re: https://www.hifa.org/dgroups-rss/communities-practice-global-health ]
Thanks Neil for raising this issue. I have over the years joined many CoPs and their value has been variable. HIFA is the one that I still engage with most regularly (albeit as a reader of posts rather than an active contributor of content, although I intend to change that!)
Currently, alongside HIFA I am part of a number of WHO CoPs. In no particular order: 1) WHO infection prevention and control (IPC) CoP - this is one of a number of the department of integrated health services communities, I will provide the link to all of these at the end; 2) WHO Quality of Care CoP; 3) WHO Global Patient Safety Network.
You can join one or all of these at this link: https://ihshub.org/topics
Important to note that with the movement at WHO some of this may change. I am a topic lead for leadership on the Patient Safety Learning (PSL) Hub. PSL Hub is an online platform for patient safety and its various communities of interest "give people a place to discuss patient safety concerns and how to address them." Joining link here: https://www.pslhub.org/ I am also currently setting up a "closed" CoP for a specific initiative and learning much from HIFA's M.O. I do agree that cross-pollination across different communities would be refreshing. Over the years some of the communities, while certainly creating a sense of belonging and solidarity, can feel a little like an echo chamber, and that has its down sides.
Thanks again Neil. Jules
HIFA profile: Julie Storr has over a decade of experience working for WHO on the development, implementation and evaluation of global improvement programmes in the field of patient safety, quality and infection prevention and control, with a focus on behaviour change. Her current work spans two WHO units – quality Universal Health Coverage and Global Infection Prevention and Control (IPC). Her technical and leadership expertise was called on to support WHO’s Ebola response and recovery efforts in 2014/15, with a focus on national IPC policy development in Sierra Leone. She led on the development of the recently published evidence based WHO Guidelines on the Core Components of Infection Prevention and Control Programmes at the National and Acute Health Care Facility Level. She was previously President of the Infection Prevention Society of the UK and Ireland, Assistant Director at the English National Patient Safety Agency and Director of the seminal cleanyourhands campaign. Julie has authored a book (Perspectives and Perceptions of IPC – highly commended at the 2016 BMA Medical Book Awards), published widely in the academic literature and is peer reviewer of a range of academic journals including Implementation Science, and on the international advisory board of the Journal of Infection Prevention. She is currently studying for a doctorate in public health (health care leadership and management) at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore. She is a member of the HIFA Steering Group and HIFA Partnerships and Projects Working Group. https://www.hifa.org/support/members/julie-0 Email: julesstorr AT me.com