Building Ghana’s EECC training capacity
By Dr Ama Kwakyewaa Bedu-Addo
Lead, EECC Global Ghana Hub
Every movement begins with a few committed people.
On 29th June 2026, Ghana completed its first Essential Emergency and Critical Care (EECC) Training of Trainers programme, with 20 healthcare professionals graduating as EECC facilitators.
Reaching this point took months of planning, problem-solving and persistence. Like many locally led initiatives, there were practical hurdles to overcome, including securing the resources needed for training materials and facilities. Seeing the programme finally take place (and seeing the commitment of the participants!) made all that effort worthwhile.
The new facilitators came from across emergency and critical care disciplines. Over the course of the programme, they developed the knowledge and facilitation skills needed to deliver EECC training to other healthcare professionals.
EECC is the basic, life-saving care that all critically ill patients should receive in every hospital. It includes the timely recognition of critical illness and simple actions such as monitoring vital signs, providing oxygen and fluids when needed, positioning patients appropriately, and reassessing them frequently.
A Training of Trainers is therefore about much more than completing a single course. By developing a group of local facilitators, we are creating the capacity for EECC training to continue and expand within Ghana without depending on external trainers each time.
I am extremely grateful to everyone who helped make the programme possible. In particular, I would like to thank Dr Anastasia Ohene and Dr Patience Adjepong for their dedication and determination throughout the process.
Our next step will come in October, when these facilitators will help train the first 100 healthcare professionals during the Ghana Society of Anaesthetists’ GaS @30 Pre-Conference Workshop.
Twenty facilitators may sound like a modest beginning. But each of them now has the potential to train and support many more healthcare professionals in the years ahead.
This is how local capacity grows: one committed group, one course and one hospital at a time.
