Leadership in Nigerian health system for cancer prevention and control.
Unacceptable health system outcomes are often related to problems with leadership because the ultimate responsibility for assigned work rests on leadership. In this paper, proper leadership at micro and macro-levels can have positive impact on the health and well being of citizens. While this may be readily obvious in other spheres, it has not been addressed adequately in the context of health care systems and its impact on health outcomes. In this paper, I discuss types of work and leadership systems in order to highlight the importance of leadership and leadership training in collaborative training and research for cancer management. The complexity of health systems highlight the expanded role of leadership in terms of capacity and capability to control the environmental risk factors for cancer, deploy adequate resources for the management of cancers, and ensure fruitful and productive post treatment life for citizens. Improved community awareness, better training of health care workers, improved working environment based on better interpersonal relationships between all cadres of health care workers, environmental health and safety initiatives and research on cancer are some of the areas where improved leadership can lead to better health outcomes. Effective leadership requires a set of skills that can be acquired with requisite operating environment, political will and adequate funding in order to generate the expected improvements in outcome.
Institute of Public Administration and Extension Services, Ekenwan Campus, University of Benin, Benin City, Edo State, Nigeria. ogbirose@yahoo.com
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D003695:Delivery of Health Care / Q000458:organization & administration*; D006801:Humans; D007857:Leadership; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000517:prevention & control*; D009549:Nigeria; D015279:Organizational Culture; D009936:Organizational Innovation; D011361:Professional Competence; D012106:Research