FACILITATING HEALTH PROFESSIONAL SCHOLARSHIP THROUGH A WORKSHOP SERIES AT THE UNIVERSITY OF RWANDA

BACKGROUND: Scholarly writing and effective presentation skills are important for dissemination of research results and the extension of knowledge. Lack of confidence, practice, and technical skills in scholarly writing are barriers to publishing and presenting in sub-Saharan Africa.

OBJECTIVES: To address these obstacles, a six-month writing workshop was delivered to faculty at the University of Rwanda.

METHODS: The workshop design required participants meet every two weeks to learn about scholarship/medical writing through both didactic and theory application. Evaluation processes measured participants’ satisfaction with the workshops, degree of motivation to pursue scholarly activities, and amount of transfer of theory and knowledge.

RESULTS: Attendance at the workshops varied from 9 to 80 participants with a mean attendance of 23.The participants self-reported their understanding of the theory at the beginning and at the conclusion of the workshops resulting in an increase of 4.0 point difference on a scale of 0 to 10 in knowledge and understanding of workshop content.

CONCLUSION: At the conclusion of the series 77% of participants confirmed they had developed an abstract or draft manuscript during the workshop, 69% planned to publish in the next year, and 85% noted they planned to deliver a presentation at a conference within the next year.