Introductory meeting of representatives of the Embassy of Switzerland in Ukraine with Lviv partners of the Medical Education Development project

Simone Troller, the new deputy head of the office of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, together with Petro Ilkiv, project coordinator of the Embassy of Switzerland in Ukraine, and Olena Ihnashchuk and Vitalii Zaiets, project managers of the Ukrainian-Swiss Medical Education Development Project, visited the project partners.  

 According to Ms Simone, such meetings are essential for direct study of project life; they help to learn and hear live feedback and plan work more effectively. 

 First, the team visited Andriy Krupynsky Lviv Medical Academy. During this meeting, Ms Simone saw the initiatives implemented thanks to our project: student and simulation spaces. We were able to discuss with the teachers how we implement our activities, strategic development in general and staff development in particular; project investments in equipment; monitoring of results, such as student satisfaction; research we conducted before and after the implementation of activities and the whole range of activities we do for quality changes in medical education. 

 The next stop was the outpatient clinic “Svoi.Ridni“. Here, colleagues had the opportunity to talk to family doctors and representatives of the Academy of Family Medicine of Ukraine, Ihor Zastavnyi, Anastasiia Khodan, and Sofia Nastyshyn. 

 They gave a general overview of the practice and focused on the differences in the approach to work in the public and private sectors. During the meeting, the experts also discussed how family medicine has changed after the healthcare reform, what the requests of family doctors are for further development, how vital continuous professional development is, the importance of communication with patients, etc. A peer group is operating based on the Svoi.Ridni facility, which involves family workers from different institutions. The peer group is facilitated by Anna Sokhan, one of our project’s first peer group facilitators at the stage of implementation of this activity. 

 We also discussed the updated Master’s program in Healthcare Management at the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, as management skills are essential for healthcare professionals and all those involved in this field to manage the institution, its potential, and resources.