I was invited to be present at the recently held annual meeting of the Emmanuel Hospital Association, which is an occasion for the officers of all the hospitals under its federation to come together to look back and look forward. I was present for such a meeting after five years and it was a learning experience for me.
I observed generational transition in leadership, exercise of appropriate good governance practices, contextualisation of the mission of the organisation to include the aspiration of the local communities the hospitals serve, etc.
When over 100 people gathered for the meeting, I wondered how such a meeting makes an individual impact on the formative thinking of the mission of the organisation. One illustration helped me to understand the the critical role of mini meetings taking place between people outside the main meetings.
One participant mentioned to me that during the meal times he heard about the way a hospital has reorganised its out-patient services to expedite the delivery of service to those who come. The patients wait patiently to be called. It occurred to the management team to use this waiting time to have group interactions for health education, participatory appraisal of the needs of the community, enquiry into the state of health and economic status of the community, etc. It was during such an interaction, the hospital team discovered the debt trap the patients fall into to, to pay for hospital stay and purchase of medicines. It was this which made the hospital to offer an insurance package suitable to the needs of the rural community.
I was encouraged to hear this story of how informal personal sharing between people is an important gain from formal meetings!
M.C.Mathew(text and photo)
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