Twenty years of Primafamed Network in Africa : looking back at the future

In September 1997 in Durban (South Africa), a workshop was organised with the eight South African departments and the four Flemish departments of Family Medicine and Primary Care in order to explore opportunities for cooperation. In the ‘Durban Declaration’,1 the eight South African departments agreed to establish a consortium for cooperation to develop a common vision for vocational training in family medicine. The Family Medicine Educational Consortium (FaMEC) organised regularly inter-university meetings to develop a common curriculum. In 2003, FaMEC obtained a grant from the Flemish Inter-university Council (VLIRUOS) for the project ‘Optimisation of the Vocational Medical Training in Family Medicine/Primary Health Care in South Africa: A contribution to the realisation of health for all’. Prof. J. Hugo (University of Pretoria) acted as the first coordinator and stimulated development of a ‘Train the Trainer’ programme. Practical training was organised in ‘training complexes’, consisting of community health centres with the cooperating ‘clinics’ and ‘district hospitals’. In 2006, there was an extension of the programme, involving institutions like Aga Khan University (Tanzania), Moi University (Eldoret, Kenya), University of Goma (Democratic Republic of Congo), National University of Rwanda (Kigali-Huye), Makerere University (Kampala) and Mbarara University of Science and Technology, both in Uganda. The financing by the Belgian Developmental Cooperation Agency and a ‘South-South-Strategy’ with mutual information sharing contributed to appropriate educational models, taking into account the different contexts and health systems.