Children’s HeartLink
Member profile
Children’s HeartLink (CH) is a non-governmental organization based in Minnesota, USA dedicated to developing sustainable programs to prevent and treat children’s heart disease globally in the underserved areas. It empowers volunteer medical personnel from leading institutions to change lives worldwide. Now in its 40th year, CH partners with hospitals in India, China, Ukraine, Vietnam, Malaysia, South Africa, Kenya and Brazil.
Main activities
CH sends volunteer medical teams and individual consultants to partner sites to train, teach and perform life-saving heart procedures for children. It provides opportunities for physicians, nurses and technicians from developing countries to receive the most current training in the prevention and treatment of heart disease. In addition, CH facilitates off-site training both in centers of excellence within their own country, region or elsewhere in the world. Staff training may be considered for any site employee who can affect the quality of the pediatric cardiac services. This comprehensive approach increases effectiveness from initial diagnosis to post-operative treatment and infection control.
Links to the health workforce crisis
In South Africa, Children's HeartLink is collaborating with the Red Cross War Memorial Children's Hospital in Cape Town to assist them in managing cardiac care nurse migration.
The goals of the collaboration are:
- to implement activities which promote staff development through targeted and increased educational opportunities;
- to improve working conditions by promoting alternatives in nursing care practices and policies; and
- to increase resources to support staff development and involvement associated with the project.
This is accomplished by:
- using a twinning partner – Lucile Packard Children's Hospital at Stanford University;
- assistance in development of nursing protocols, policies and procedures for nurse education and management;
- introduction of new and alternative nursing care management practices; and
- development of interactive online education tools.
Call for knowledge information:
Alliance Members are invited to submit any relevant knowledge products such as documents, reports, tools, multimedia, links to specific project web sites by sending an email to ghwa@who.int. The Alliance Secretariat will publish relevant products on the Member's page.
Visit our Knowledge centre.
