Katarzyna Czabanowska

Although leadership is a well-known concept within organisational science, public health leadership is still not well-defined. Further, leadership is not commonly included in most public health training programs. Faced with immense changes in population health needs, public health professionals require a broader range of skills and expertise than ever before. In response to these issues the article aims to describe the development of a public health leadership curriculum as part of the European project entitled “Leaders for European Public Health” (LEPHIE) supported by the European Commission Lifelong Learning Programme. The article first discusses the theoretical underpinnings related to the public health leadership curriculum development. Secondly, its mission and objectives will be discussed. Thirdly, the methodological approaches and architecture of the programme are presented, and finally illustrates the features for quality assurance and the potential for future use in different contexts.

Objective: The aim of this study was to assess the necessary level of abilities and competencies of family physicians from the decision-makers’ perspective in Kosovo, a post-war country in the Western Balkans.

Methods: Our study was conducted in May-July 2013 and included a nationwide representative sample of 100 decision-makers operating at different primary health care institutions or public health agencies in Kosovo (63 men aged 48.6±5.5 years, and 65 women aged 46.2±5.7 years). A structured self-administered questionnaire was employed aiming to assess the necessary level of skills, abilities and competencies of family physicians in Kosovo regarding  different domains of the quality of health care. The questionnaire included 37 items organized into six subscales/domains. Answers for each item of the tool ranged from 1 (“novice” physicians) to 5 (“expert” physicians). An overall summary score (range: 37-185) and a subscale summary score for each domain were calculated for each participant. Cronbach’s alpha was used to assess the internal consistency of the instrument, whereas Mann-Whitney’s U-test was employed to assess sex-differences in the mean values of the summary score of 37-item instrument and the summary scores of each of the six subscales.

Results: The internal consistency of the whole scale (37 items) was Cronbach’s alpha=0.92. The summary score of the 37-item instrument was higher in men than in women (162.3±17.9 vs. 156.1±17.5, respectively, P=0.071). The subscale scores were all higher in men than in women, a finding which was borderline statistically significant for the “patient care and safety” domain only (33.4±4.4 vs. 32.0±4.0, respectively, P=0.057). There was a weak correlation between the overall summary score of the tool and the work experience of decision-makers (Spearman’s rho=0.234, P<0.001).

Conclusion: In the context of Kosovo, this study provides important evidence on the expected skills and competencies of family physicians from the decision-makers’ viewpoint. Future studies in Kosovo should compare our findings related to the necessary skills and competencies vis-à-vis the actual self-perceived skills and competencies of family physicians.