Heimerer College
I am a medical doctor and a UK-trained public health ; I speak fluent Albanian (mother tongue) and English, having lived, studied and worked ; I have experience of working in Albania, both in clinical medicine and public health, the wider region (Kosovo) and developing countries in Africa (Rwanda and Uganda).
As a qualified medical doctor, I have considerable experience in both General Practice and Emergency Medicine. My primary medical qualification has allowed me to practise clinical medicine in both Europe and Africa. I am educated and trained in epidemiology and public health at both undergraduate and postgraduate (MSc) levels. I have managed clinical facilities and delivered public health programmes and projects in two developing countries: Albania and ; In Uganda I have conducted field research in infectious diseases, and co-ordinated healthcare provision for a major Western diplomatic mission.
In both my clinical and project management work, I have developed high-level monitoring and evaluation skills, including applying economics-based approaches to appraising the effectiveness of projects. I have led and managed the Health Department of a major national NGO (Caritas Albania) as well as the Accident and Emergency Department of Rwanda’s leading ; I have a strong focus on ensuring value for money. I have managed significant project funds, including programmes of technical assistance. I have, where necessary, curtailed projects that were not delivering results.
I have in-depth understanding of healthcare models in the developing world. I have worked in a range of contexts, from the strong central government control model of Rwanda (in a government-owned hospital) to the post-Communist corruptive/dysfunctional health service of Albania. I have considerable experience of healthcare in transitional economies and developing specialized public health strategies. In Rwanda and Uganda, I have gained a thorough grounding in the specific areas of tropical medicine, including malaria, and TB and HIV/AIDS epidemiology, prevention, care and treatment and health system ; I conducted in-depth field research into strategies for reducing mother to child transmission of HIV/AIDS in Uganda as part of my MSc studies and dissertation at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. I have excellent oral and written communication skills, and the proven ability to influence both internal and external ; Co-ordinating and developing partnerships with stakeholders was essential to the success of my work at Caritas Albania, where I had to work closely with the national government, technical expertise groups in country and international donors.
I recently worked for over six months in a voluntary role at UNICEF Kosovo, which has given me a good grounding in the UN system and particularly evaluation and capacity strengthening of government public health ; I assessed the Kosovan Government’s family medicine programme and produced recommendations to improve its performance.
My work at King Faisal Hospital in Kigali, Rwanda combined clinical and management ; I led the Accident and Emergency Department through a period of assessments by the regional accreditation body COHSASA, pioneering new quality assurance methodologies to bring the department up to international ; This contributed to successful ; I also delivered occupational health services to hospital staff, in an environment where exposure to HIV contaminated instruments was one of the principle occupational risks to clinical ; This required me to develop expertise in post-exposure prophylaxis protocols.
I am currently the co-ordinator of the nursing BSc programme at Heimerer College, a private university in Pristina, ; I am responsible for academic staff management, strategic curriculum planning and quality assurance of the degree ; A significant element of my job involves monitoring and evaluation of course ; This includes developing and improving mechanisms for feedback on teacher and student performance and using management information to develop institutional ; The nursing degree awarded by my programme is recognised by the German and Swiss governments, and I ensure we continue to meet international standards to retain this accreditation.
I have the necessary experience and skills in people and resource ;