Establishing an Online Continuing and Professional Development Library for Nurses and Midwives in East, Central, and Southern Africa

Over the past 4 years, the African Health Profession Regulatory Collaborative for nurses and midwives has supported 12 countries establish national continuing and professional development frameworks and programs, linking continuing education to nursing and midwifery re-licensure through technical assistance and improvement grants. However, lack of electronic media and rural practice sites, differences in priority content, and varying legal frameworks make providing accessible, certifiable, and up-to-date online continuing education content for the more than 300,000 nurses and midwives in the 17 member countries of the East, Central, and Southern Africa College of Nursing a major challenge. We report here on how the East, Central, and Southern Africa College of Nursing, with technical assistance from an Afya Bora Fellow, developed an online continuing professional development library hosted on their Web site using data collected in a survey of nursing and midwifery leaders in the region.