8 May 2026

The fifth and final day of the IS4NCDs Regional Consortium Meeting brought together partners from across the consortium at the Wits School of Public Health in Johannesburg to consolidate a week of intense and productive discussions. With clear decisions made, timelines set, and responsibilities assigned, the meeting closed on a note of genuine optimism and shared purpose.

Finalising the Teaching Faculty

The morning session focused on several items that required final clarity before the week's close. A significant portion of the discussion centred on identifying and confirming the faculty who will lead and contribute to each module. Breakout groups worked through the core, intermediate, and advanced modules, mapping out module leads, co-facilitators, and potential guest lecturers from across the consortium's institutions.

The consortium agreed on the importance of having a clearly identified lead for each module to ensure accountability and coordination. It was also noted that visiting faculty from partner institutions, particularly those travelling to observe piloting at other sites, could actively contribute to teaching — strengthening knowledge transfer across the consortium.

Conclusions and the Path Forward

Following the coffee break, a comprehensive summary of the week's outcomes was presented, along with key next steps. Reflecting on the meeting's opening goals, it was noted that all had been achieved: relationships deepened, breakout sessions produced concrete decisions, and a provisional piloting timeline is now in place.

Core Modules will be piloted in an innovative format, with face-to-face classrooms running simultaneously at four institutions — Wits, Stellenbosch, the University of Zambia, and Copperbelt University — connected virtually. This approach effectively enables 12 pilots across three modules in approximately three weeks. The Fundamentals of Implementation Science short course is planned for the first week of October, followed by the NCD Epidemiology module in the fourth week of October and the Monitoring & Evaluation module in the first week of November. Up to 100 participants will be engaged across these workshops, drawing from a multidisciplinary pool including health professionals, social scientists, and implementation science practitioners.

Intermediate Modules — Mixed Methods, Quality Improvement, and Participatory Action Research — will be offered fully online, with delivery beginning in mid-October and running through to early December. These courses, led by the Stellenbosch team, will be open to participants from across sub-Saharan Africa, with geographically representative selection criteria ensuring broad regional participation. Each module will accommodate up to 35 participants, with a portfolio-based assessment component to support both transformative learning and project evaluation.

Advanced Modules in health economics, context and complexity, and implementation science theories and frameworks are planned for November, offered as face-to-face workshops with CPD accreditation. The theory and frameworks module will be anchored by the LMU team, while CBU and Wits will jointly lead health economics content.

The Executive Course is tentatively planned for June–July 2027, linked where possible to the next full consortium meeting. It will be a two-and-a-half-day face-to-face programme for 10 senior health leaders, with a rigorous selection process to ensure participants are true executives in their fields.

Evaluation, Ethics, and Publications

The consortium reaffirmed its commitment to a robust evaluation framework. An ethics application is being prepared through Institute of Tropical Medicine to obtain initial approval covering all module evaluations, with the goal of having ethical clearance in place before the first pilot. Key evaluation elements include pre- and post-module competency assessments, participant demographics to track equity and reach, qualitative analysis of portfolio reflections, and focus group discussions with knowledge creation teams and teaching faculty.

The group also discussed a growing body of publications emerging from the project — including a literature-based competency framework and a regional survey — and called on consortium members to consider how they might contribute to the writing and dissemination of findings.

Key Deadlines

A set of immediate action points was confirmed before the close:

• Implementation roadmaps (Parts A and B) for CBU, Wits, and Stellenbosch to be submitted by 15 May 2026
• CPD and micro-credential accreditation submissions to be completed by end of May–June 2026, depending on institution
• First version of the mid-term progress report to be ready by end of May, with final submission by 30 June 2026
• Centralised expression of interest for all modules to be live by 15 August 2026
• Participant selection completed by 1 September 2026

The formal closing of the meeting was marked by warm words of thanks from the Wits local organising team and — in a fitting Wits tradition — a group photograph in the atrium. The executive leadership offered closing remarks commending the team for an exceptional week.

Particular thanks were extended to the Wits hosting team, whose logistical support made the full in-person meeting possible, having originally been planned as a virtual event.

The next full consortium meeting will be hosted by Stellenbosch University in the Western Cape province of South Africa in 2027. In the meantime, three virtual or hybrid check-ins are planned around the piloting period to keep the consortium connected and aligned.

As the week drew to a close, the mood was clear: the foundations have been laid, the timelines are set, and the IS4NCDs consortium is ready to move from planning to action — with a shared commitment to strengthening implementation science capacity and combating non-communicable diseases across Africa.

7 May 2026

The fourth day of the IS4NCDs Regional Consortium Meeting in Johannesburg was a full and substantive one, covering project administration, pilot scheduling, publication planning, and the development of an evaluation framework.

The day opened with a project management and coordination session, during which the consortium received a comprehensive overview of upcoming deadlines, milestones, and deliverables for the remainder of the year and into the project's final year. Key administrative matters addressed included the submission of implementation programmes, applications for micro-credentials, and progress reports — all with deadlines falling within the coming months.

The consortium was reminded of the importance of timely communication regarding any anticipated delays, as well as the need to maintain thorough financial and administrative records, given that the project remains subject to external review for several years beyond its end date. Financial arrangements — including the structure of the pre-financing model and the timeline for final project payments — were also clarified, with an open invitation for partner institutions to raise any concerns about their capacity to manage interim costs.

Guidance was provided on external communication requirements, including the mandatory use of the project's visual identity and EU funding acknowledgements across all dissemination and communication activities. The consortium was also introduced to an impact tracker tool designed to help partners log their dissemination activities throughout the project's lifetime, ensuring accurate reporting at the project's conclusion.

A significant portion of the morning was dedicated to the collaborative development of a pilot schedule for the project's nine modules, which span core, intermediate, advanced, and executive levels. Working in module-type groups, consortium members worked through a shared planning tool to map out realistic timelines for piloting, taking into account academic calendars, accreditation timelines, public holidays, and staffing availability across the participating institutions.

Each group reported back to the plenary with their provisional plans. Across the board, the second half of the calendar year emerged as the most feasible window for piloting, with most contact sessions planned between August and November. The executive-level course, designed as a condensed in-person offering for a small cohort of senior professionals, was provisionally planned for the following year, to allow it to benefit from lessons learned during the earlier pilots.

The plenary noted the clustering of pilot activities in October and November, flagging this as a potential operational risk, and encouraged groups to consider spreading activities where possible. Discussions also touched on participant sequencing across modules, delivery modalities (online, face-to-face, and hybrid), and the importance of coordinating teaching responsibilities across consortium members.

The afternoon began with a structured overview of the consortium's publication pipeline. It was acknowledged that while the project's primary mandate is curriculum development, academic publication remains an important vehicle for dissemination and knowledge contribution. An authorship policy — already circulated among consortium members — was briefly revisited, with a reminder that authorship requires active contribution at multiple stages of the writing process in line with internationally recognised criteria.

Several publications were discussed, spanning the full arc of the project: from an overarching descriptive paper introducing the project as a whole, to evaluations of the individual modules, to more conceptually focused pieces on topics such as challenge-based learning, competency development, and the use of co-design in curriculum development. Two publications are already in active development, with the remainder dependent on the outcomes of the piloting phase. The consortium agreed on a process whereby new publication ideas should be submitted to the steering committee for review and approval before work commences, in order to ensure strategic coordination across the consortium.

The potential for conference presentations and abstract submissions was also raised, with members encouraged to flag relevant upcoming events early so that the consortium could be deliberate in its dissemination strategy.

The final session of the day focused on how the consortium will evaluate its work — both at the level of individual modules and across the project as a whole. Following a brief energising activity, the group engaged in an open discussion on evaluation approaches, drawing on established frameworks from the fields of implementation science and training evaluation.

The conversation explored how best to capture participant learning and professional transformation, with proposals including pre- and post-assessments, reflective portfolios, and retrospective self-assessment tools. The relative merits of quantitative and qualitative approaches were considered, and the group discussed how data gathered through module evaluations could feed into broader project-level evaluation and, ultimately, into academic publications.

A key outcome of this discussion was agreement on the need to develop an overarching evaluation protocol to be submitted for ethics review, with the aim of securing approval in time for the commencement of piloting. A small core writing group volunteered to take this forward, with an initial draft to be shared with the wider consortium in the coming weeks. It was noted that the ethics submission deadline would need to be met by June in order to receive approval before the end of September — when piloting is due to begin.

The day closed with a clear sense of momentum. The consortium had moved from broad planning to tangible commitments: a provisional pilot calendar, a coordinated publication plan, and a path forward for ethical approvals. The writing group for the evaluation protocol was asked to remain briefly to begin dividing tasks, while the rest of the group was released for the afternoon.

7 May 2026

The third day of the IS4NCDs Regional Consortium Meeting brought together academics, researchers, health professionals, and knowledge creation teams from across Southern Africa and beyond for another productive session. With key curriculum decisions already made on Day 2, the group turned its energy toward the substance of advanced module design, an ambitious executive course concept, and the pedagogical principles that will underpin the entire training programme.

Reflecting on Progress: Decisions That Lifted the Weight

The day opened with a recap of the week's milestones. The facilitator noted with evident relief that the group had successfully resolved some of the most consequential questions facing the project: where the pilot modules would be offered, for which audiences, in what format, and on what timelines.

The agreed approach is to offer core modules as workshops — designed to the rigour of a short course but delivered in workshop format across four participating institutions simultaneously. This model allows the consortium to pilot effectively within the project's timeframe while the formal accreditation processes run in parallel. Synchronous virtual lectures, streamed live into all four institutional venues, will ensure consistency of delivery while capping on-site attendance at each location.

Intermediate modules are being positioned for formal short course accreditation before their pilot, with particular strategic importance for Stellenbosch University, where the modules are expected to catalyse an implementation science programme that has been approved but not yet fully executed. Advanced modules will be offered initially as workshops, similarly designed as short courses, with a view to longer-term integration into existing academic programmes.

Advanced Modules Take Shape

Much of the morning was devoted to presentations and discussion of the three advanced modules under development.

Health Economics in the Implementation of Health Programmes

The first advanced module addresses a recognised gap: while many practitioners working in the NCD space may have some exposure to health economics, few have engaged with how economic thinking applies specifically during the implementation process. The module aims to equip learners — including post-graduate students, early career researchers, health professionals, and programme managers — with the conceptual knowledge and practical skills to assess costs, evaluate cost-effectiveness, conduct budget impact analyses, and communicate economic findings to multidisciplinary audiences and policy makers.

Presenters highlighted a shortage of local economic data on NCD implementation in Southern Africa and noted limited methodological capacity among implementation scientists to conduct comprehensive economic evaluations. The module is designed to bridge this gap, helping practitioners build the economic arguments necessary to drive implementation and sustain programmes in resource-constrained settings.

The proposed format is a five-day or block-week professional development course combining approximately 20 contact hours of taught content, 10 hours of case studies and practical exercises grounded in challenge-based learning, and substantial independent reading. The module's design reflects the dual needs of practitioners who may have no economics background and those who have economics training but need to understand the implementation dimension.

Theories, Models, and Frameworks in Implementation Science

The second advanced module tackles the conceptual architecture of implementation science itself — and does so with a deliberate Southern African lens. Presenters noted that most existing implementation science frameworks are Eurocentric or Western-centric in origin, and that when applied uncritically in African contexts, they may not account for the specific social, political, and infrastructural realities of low- and middle-income settings.

The module traces a five-day arc: from foundational knowledge of theories, models, and frameworks, through analysis of mechanisms of change, into the development of contextually grounded implementation frameworks, and finally into adaptation and evaluation of those frameworks. A central ambition is to equip participants not only to use existing frameworks but to critically assess their relevance, adapt them to local contexts, and, where necessary, develop new ones.

Discussion noted the importance of aligning the module's hours carefully with credit requirements and confirmed that, given its scope, the module would function as a two-and-a-half-day intensive workshop in the pilot phase, with expanded delivery possible depending on institutional accreditation needs.

Context, Complexity, and Multi-Sectoral Engagement

The third advanced module focuses on understanding context as a determinant of implementation — an area that often appears as a small sub-component of broader frameworks but rarely receives dedicated attention.

The module aims to develop advanced theoretical and practical competencies to analyse context dynamics, apply principles of complexity science, map stakeholder power, and design implementation strategies that are adaptive rather than linear. A five-day workshop structure was proposed, moving from foundations of context and systems thinking through stakeholder engagement and power analysis, adaptive strategy design, and ultimately scaling and sustainability.

A key suggestion was to strengthen the module's treatment of context monitoring and analysis — not just identifying contextual factors, but operationalising how they are measured and tracked over time. The facilitator acknowledged that the evaluation of context over time is indeed currently missing from the design and committed to incorporating it.

The Executive Course: Designing for Senior Decision-Makers

A dedicated session was given to the executive course in implementation science — a distinct offering aimed at senior managers and decision-makers, designed to equip them to drive impact on non-communicable diseases at a systems level.

Unlike the other modules, which have progressed through detailed content development, the executive course is deliberately at an earlier stage. The rationale offered by the presenting team was that the content of this course should draw substantially from the nine modules being developed by the consortium, and that its format must be shaped by a proper needs assessment of its target audience before any content decisions are made.

The planned needs assessment will take the form of a survey distributed across consortium members and key community of practice stakeholders, followed by a series of workshops — both virtual and in-person — to determine what senior professionals need to know, how they prefer to learn, and what format is feasible given the realities of their roles.

Participants in the session offered a number of insights that will shape the course's development. Several speakers emphasised that business schools — with their established models for executive education — offer useful benchmarks for format and delivery. The Graduate School of Business at the University of Cape Town was cited as one reference point, as were executive programmes at the University of Zambia.

There was broad agreement that the consortium's collective institutional credibility is sufficient to anchor the course's legitimacy without requiring partnerships with European or American institutions per se — though the importance of not reinventing content that already exists in open or accessible formats was noted. Strategic curation of existing quality resources alongside bespoke IS4NCDs content was presented as both pragmatic and efficient.

The discussion also turned to the course's longer-term sustainability. Several participants framed the executive course as a potential revenue-generating asset — a cornerstone of the E-hub platform and a means of sustaining the consortium's knowledge translation work beyond the project's funding period. Two delivery models were proposed: a regularly scheduled open-enrolment course, and a customisable package that organisations such as national health departments or UN agencies can commission and tailor to their own needs.

The E-Hub: A Digital Platform for the Long Term

One of the most striking moments of the day came with the presentation of a conceptual digital learning platform — referred to as the E-hub — envisioned as the technological infrastructure through which all IS4NCDs courses will eventually be delivered and accessed.

The presenter was careful to note that what was shown was conceptual and that names and course titles used were placeholders. The intent was to demonstrate what is possible and to invite the consortium to shape the platform's design.

The proposed system is designed around several core functions: a structured course catalogue with personalised recommendations based on learner profiles and interests; competency tracking that allows learners and institutions to monitor progress against the IS4NCDs competency framework; mentorship matching and tracking; community of practice forums that facilitate peer support and collaboration; and live and asynchronous event management.

Critically, the platform is designed for institutional flexibility. It can be accessed as a standalone hub, integrated into existing university learning management systems such as Canvas, or made available as part of government human resource development plans — enabling national health departments to offer courses to all staff using verified institutional credentials.

The presentation drew enthusiastic responses. Participants were particularly excited about the platform's potential as a regional resource — one that could serve not only individual learners but entire government departments, and that could grow into a broader ecosystem connecting research evidence, data, and implementation science capacity across Southern Africa. The potential to incorporate AI-assisted learning pathways, matching learner profiles to the most relevant courses and resources based on verifiable contextual data, was raised as a future-facing ambition that the technical team is already exploring in related work.

On the practical question of sustainability, the consortium acknowledged that operating the platform will require a sustainable business model and likely a dedicated local technology partner. The team confirmed that subcontracting arrangements have already been explored, with quotations received from four providers and a preferred partner selected on the basis of their understanding of both academic institutional requirements and online platform development.

Transformative Learning and Challenge-Based Pedagogy

The afternoon sessions brought a more pedagogical focus, as participants engaged with the didactic principles that will animate all IS4NCDs modules: transformative learning and challenge-based learning (CBL).

The presenting facilitator walked the group through a foundational understanding of transformative learning — the kind of deep learning that changes a learner's perspective by prompting critical reflection on existing beliefs and assumptions. An interactive exercise using optical illusions illustrated how perspectives can shift in a moment, grounding the concept viscerally before the theoretical discussion began.

Four dimensions of transformative learning were presented as relevant to the consortium's work: what it is, what triggers it, what it looks like in practice, and how it can be embedded in module design. Participants were invited to bring these dimensions into their group work, considering how their specific module designs can create conditions for genuine perspective shifts.

Challenge-based learning was discussed as a complementary approach, structuring learning around real-world, complex NCD problems that require learners to apply knowledge, collaborate, and propose contextually grounded solutions. The relationship between CBL and transformative learning was described as mutually reinforcing: the challenge itself can serve as a trigger for transformative reflection.

Groups then broke into their respective module teams — core, intermediate, and advanced — to apply these concepts directly to their roadmap documents, identifying transformation points, linking learning outcomes more explicitly to the competency framework, and responding to a series of guiding questions about how to create safe spaces for reflection, integrate mentorship, and make transformative potential explicit in module instructions.

Reporting back from the groups revealed productive progress across all three levels. The core group noted that many transformative and CBL elements were already present in their roadmap and that the afternoon's work was largely one of alignment and articulation. The intermediate group proposed a set of structured "transformation points" — pre-reading, explicit group dialogue in the first week, peer-to-peer reflection, and ongoing mentorship — to make the transformation journey visible and deliberate for learners. The advanced group identified a distinct "big idea" for each of their three modules: equitable resource allocation in constrained settings for health economics; complexity for the context and multi-sectoral engagement module; and context for the theories, models, and frameworks module.

Looking Ahead

The day closed with thanks to participants and a look toward the remaining days of the meeting, which will focus on project management and timelines. The facilitator called on all groups to arrive ready to assign concrete dates to their module development milestones — recognising that the next major gathering is approximately a year away and that the pilots need to be delivered within the project's timeframe.

As participants gathered for a group photograph before their free evening, there was a palpable sense that the week had achieved something substantial: a shared vision not only of what the IS4NCDs training programme will look like, but of the infrastructure, pedagogy, and values that will carry it forward.

6 May 2006

The Implementation Science for Non-Communicable Diseases (IS4NCDs) Regional Consortium has taken a significant step forward in addressing the persistent gap between evidence and practice in NCD care across Africa. On day 2 of the IS4NCDs Regional Consortium Meeting held in Johannesburg, consortium members presented and discussed an Implementation Roadmap covering three new intermediate training modules designed to equip health workers, researchers, and programme implementers with the practical skills needed to improve NCD outcomes at scale.

The roadmap — developed collaboratively by Stellenbosch University (SUN), the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), the University of Zambia (UNZA), and other consortium partners — was shared as a structured planning document outlining both the curriculum design and the institutional delivery plans for each module.

Why These Modules? The Implementation Gap in NCD Care

Despite the availability of clinical guidelines for the prevention, screening, diagnosis, and treatment of non-communicable diseases, outcomes remain suboptimal across Sub-Saharan Africa. The roadmap's introduction frames the core challenge clearly: the chronic nature of NCDs — often involving multimorbidity, sustained self-management, and repeated contacts with health systems — means that even small failures in care delivery accumulate over time and undermine patient outcomes.

The consortium identified that existing training in quality improvement (QI) and implementation science (IS) has largely been delivered in parallel, without meaningful integration. QI programmes tend to focus on practical improvement methods, while IS programmes emphasise conceptual frameworks and research design — leaving a gap in applied, executable capability that frontline implementers urgently need. Critically, none of the existing QI training offerings in the region were specifically tailored to the NCD implementation context.

This is the gap the new IS4NCDs intermediate modules are designed to fill.

Three Modules, One Integrated Vision

The Implementation Roadmap covers three interconnected intermediate modules, each targeting a distinct but complementary capability area:

1. Quality in Implementation Science (QI Module)

Led by Stellenbosch University, this five-day intensive module targets frontline health workers and mid-level staff involved in QI initiatives. Participants work through the full arc of a quality improvement project — from problem identification and root cause analysis, to designing PDSA cycles and measuring outcomes — with explicit application to NCD service delivery.

The curriculum draws on major frameworks including the Model for Improvement (IHI), Lean, Six Sigma, and the Donabedian Model, while also engaging with South Africa's National Core Standards, Ideal Clinics Programme, and WHO's PEN and HEARTS technical packages. A notable feature is its use of Challenge-Based Learning (CBL), in which interdisciplinary participant groups identify a real-world NCD health systems gap on Day 1 and develop a full QI project proposal by Day 5 — assessed through a combination of presentations, group work, and an individual written component.

The module was developed building on Stellenbosch University's existing postgraduate QI offering, with additional input from QI experts at Wits and a structured review of offerings from UNISA, Harvard, the IHI Open School, and other institutions.

2. Mixed Methods Research in Implementation Science (MM Module)

This semester-long module (13 weeks, 10 credits) is designed for postgraduate students, early-career researchers, and NGO/government staff involved in NCD programme evaluation. Delivered in a hybrid format, it equips learners to design, conduct, and critically appraise mixed methods studies within an implementation science framework.

The rationale is compelling: implementation challenges in NCD care rarely have single-cause explanations. Quantitative data can reveal where gaps exist — in treatment initiation, retention, or disease control rates — but qualitative inquiry is needed to explain why those gaps persist. Together, mixed methods approaches strengthen causal inference, improve strategy tailoring, and enable more robust implementation evaluations.

The module covers core designs (convergent parallel, explanatory sequential, exploratory sequential, embedded, and multiphase), with a strong emphasis on integration — the defining feature that distinguishes genuine mixed methods research from simply running parallel studies. Assessment centres on a group-developed mixed methods research proposal addressing a locally relevant NCD problem.

The curriculum was benchmarked against offerings from the University of Toronto, UC San Diego, University of Southampton, and the University of Florida, while being adapted for the realities of low- and middle-income country research training.

3. Participatory Action Research in Implementation Science (PAR Module)

Coordinated by Stellenbosch University's Prof Lynn Hendricks, this 12-credit, semester-long module makes the case that effective NCD implementation depends on genuine co-creation with those who deliver and receive care — patients, communities, frontline providers, and health managers.

The PAR module covers the philosophical foundations of participatory research, community-based participatory research (CBPR), co-design methodologies, stakeholder mapping, ethics and reflexivity, and the design of participatory implementation studies. It is grounded in African health system realities and draws on a structured review of more than 20 international programmes offering participatory research training, from the University of KwaZulu-Natal and Rhodes University to Johns Hopkins, Uppsala, and Erasmus Rotterdam.

A key finding from the consortium's formative review was that while strong global content exists on participatory research and on implementation science, few curricula bring both strands together in a way that is explicitly oriented toward NCD implementation in African contexts. This module directly responds to that gap.

Designed for Sustainability and Scale

A consistent thread across all three modules is attention to long-term sustainability. Each is designed for integration as a credit-bearing elective within existing postgraduate programmes, reducing dependence on standalone short-course funding. Annual curriculum reviews, participant feedback mechanisms, and internal and external moderation processes are all built into the institutional delivery plans.

The modules will be hosted on the IS4NCD Wits online hub (QI module) and SunLearn/Ulwazi (PAR and MM modules), ensuring accessible, scalable delivery across the consortium's partner institutions.

A Roadmap With Regional Ambition

The fact that this roadmap was developed collectively — and presented at the IS4NCDs Regional Consortium Meeting in Johannesburg for cross-institutional input and alignment — reflects the programme's broader ambition. IS4NCDs is not building capacity at one institution; it is building a regional ecosystem of implementation scientists and improvement practitioners who share frameworks, tools, and a commitment to evidence-based NCD care.

For higher education institutions in the region, the programme offers curriculum innovation aligned with national priorities for chronic disease control and universal health coverage. For health systems, it promises graduates who are not only conceptually equipped but operationally ready — able to reduce variation in care, strengthen referral systems, embed continuous measurement into routine services, and carry the evidence-to-practice work forward with communities rather than at a distance from them.

The IS4NCDs Implementation Roadmap is a detailed, actionable document. But more than that, it is a signal of what becomes possible when academic institutions, health systems, and implementation science communities work together with a shared purpose: better NCD outcomes for populations who can least afford the consequences of the know–do gap.

5 May 2026

The IS4NCDs (Implementation Science for Non-Communicable Diseases) programme aims to build regional capacity to address the growing burden of NCDs through evidence-based, contextualised implementation science. Central to this mission is the development and piloting of curriculum modules — core, intermediate, and advanced — designed to equip a diverse range of learners with the skills to bridge the gap between research evidence and real-world health practice.

Day 2 focused on two major areas: the operational and structural decisions needed to move the modules from design to delivery, and a deeper exploration of the content and frameworks underpinning the core modules.

Setting the Stage: From Recap to Decision-Making

The day opened with a structured recap of Day 1, which had covered the IS4NCDs competency framework — a set of five competency clusters spanning implementation science expertise, general research competence, communication and dissemination, and interpersonal and participatory research skills. These competencies formed the basis for linking learning outcomes across all modules.

Rather than proceeding directly to content discussions, the consortium made an important procedural decision: to first settle the operational questions — where modules will be piloted, in what format, under which accreditation structures, for which audiences, and over what duration. This decision-first approach was seen as essential for ensuring that subsequent content discussions would be grounded in realistic, agreed-upon parameters.

To support this process, a shared Excel template was distributed to all participants and working groups, enabling structured, parallel discussions across the core, intermediate, advanced, and executive course groups simultaneously.

Core Modules: Operational Decisions

The core module group — the Copperbelt University team — presented the following agreed positions:

Format: All core modules will be delivered in a hybrid workshop format, combining online and in-person elements. This was chosen to balance accessibility with the interactive, collaborative nature of the learning activities.

Piloting Across Four Institutions: A key proposal was to pilot all core modules at all four consortium institutions simultaneously. To make this feasible, the proposed model involves online lectures streamed into classrooms at each institution, with local facilitators supporting face-to-face group work in each location. This approach was noted for its efficiency — effectively running twelve pilots in the time of one — while also enabling institutions to slightly tailor the experience to their local context and target audience.

Accreditation: In Zambia, micro-credentialing frameworks do not yet exist in the same form as elsewhere. The consortium agreed to proceed with workshop delivery and Certificate of Attendance as an immediate outcome, while simultaneously pursuing formal accreditation through higher education authorities — a process estimated to take approximately six months. The long-term goal is formal micro-credentialing or short course accreditation across all participating institutions, with the understanding that terminology varies across national qualification frameworks (NQF).

There was substantive discussion around the distinction between a Certificate of Attendance and a Certificate of Competence. While the latter is more valuable to participants — particularly where credits could contribute toward a degree — it requires prior formal accreditation. Given programme timelines, the Certificate of Attendance approach for the pilot phase was accepted as a pragmatic necessity, with competence-based certification as a medium-term goal.

Target Audience: The core modules will target individuals with a minimum of a bachelor's degree, drawn from multidisciplinary backgrounds including health professionals, social scientists, computer scientists, and those already working in or adjacent to implementation science. Discussion surfaced important nuances around NQF levels — particularly for nurses and midwives whose qualifications may not be classified at bachelor's level in all national frameworks, and how institutions might accommodate this variation.

Duration: The core modules are planned as six-week programmes, with approximately 24 hours of contact time spread across the period, supplemented by individual study, group assignments, and field activities. Some participants advocated for a more compact format — ideally condensed into one or two weeks — based on experience that continuity and engagement tend to suffer in programmes spread over many weeks among working professionals.

Intermediate and Advanced Modules: Overview

While the core modules were the primary focus of the day's content discussions, leads from the intermediate and advanced module groups also presented their operational decisions.

Intermediate Modules: All intermediate modules — covering Quality Improvement, Mixed Methods, and Participatory Action Research — will be delivered fully online, structured as five-day intensive short courses with subsequent assignment periods. The exception is the Mixed Methods module, which will run over six months, with the intensive week followed by a forty-hour proposal preparation phase. Accreditation will be sought at NQF Level 9. The target audience includes health systems programme managers, clinicians, and public health practitioners, with researchers included specifically for the Mixed Methods and Participatory Action Research modules.

Advanced Modules: The advanced modules — covering Health Economics and Implementation Science, Multisectoral Approaches and Context Adaptation, and Adapting Theories, Models and Frameworks — will be delivered in a hybrid format, largely because challenge-based learning (a key pedagogical approach) was seen as difficult to implement effectively in a fully online environment. The advanced modules target participants with at least two years of experience as implementers, researchers, or programme officers. Health Economics will be offered as a five-day course, while the other two will be delivered as intensive two-and-a-half-day workshops.

Core Module Content: What Will Be Taught?

Following the operational discussion, the consortium turned to the substance of the core modules, presented by the Copperbelt University team responsible for their development.

Module 1: Fundamentals of Implementation Science

This foundational module introduces participants to the theory and practice of implementation science, with a particular focus on the African health context. Key conceptual areas include:

• Differentiating efficacy, effectiveness, and implementation — moving from "can it work?" to "does it work?" to "how can we make it work in our setting?"
• The Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research (CFIR 2.0) — a widely used framework covering intervention characteristics, inner and outer organisational settings, individual factors, and implementation processes.
• The RE-AIM Framework — focusing on Reach, Effectiveness, Adoption, Implementation, and Maintenance, with particular attention to equity across each dimension.
• Fidelity and Adaptation — exploring the balance between implementing a programme as designed and contextualising it for local realities, and the concept of core functions versus adaptable forms.

The module grounds these frameworks in the African context, where health systems have historically been oriented toward infectious disease management and are now navigating a significant epidemiological transition toward NCDs.

Module 2: NCD Epidemiology and Determinants

This module situates NCDs within the broader epidemiological and social landscape of Africa. Key areas include:

• The Syndemic Framework — rather than viewing NCDs in isolation, this framework examines the interactions between infectious diseases, NCDs, and structural barriers. For example, long-term HIV treatment has contributed to rising rates of metabolic conditions and cardiovascular disease in the region.
• The Social Ecological Model — exploring how individual health outcomes are shaped by community, organisational, and policy-level factors, and how implementation strategies must account for this hierarchy.
• Commercial Determinants of Health — including the role of industries such as tobacco, alcohol, and processed food in undermining health promotion efforts.
• Equity — a throughline across the module, examining how social determinants such as socioeconomic status continue to produce health disparities even when programmes are being implemented.

Module 3: Monitoring, Evaluation, and Programme Design

This module focuses on designing, implementing, and evaluating programmes using implementation science tools. Key areas include:

• The ERIC Taxonomy — a framework of 73 implementation strategies grouped into categories, supporting practitioners in selecting and categorising their implementation approach.
• The Implementation Logic Model — mapping from problem identification through inputs, activities, outputs, and proximal and distal outcomes.
• Implementation, Service, and Client Outcomes — understanding how effectiveness is measured at multiple levels, from programme penetration to quality of life improvements.
• Economic Evaluation — an introduction to costing and economic considerations in implementation, with deeper content reserved for the advanced Health Economics module.

Curriculum Development: A Knowledge Co-Creation Process

A distinctive feature of the IS4NCDs curriculum development process has been the formation of Knowledge Creation Teams (KCTs) — multi-stakeholder groups that contributed to shaping the content of each module. KCT members included academic staff from consortium universities, postgraduate students (including Master of Public Health students), frontline health workers such as physicians, and policy makers from Ministries of Health.

Through structured needs assessments and consultations, the KCTs informed the curriculum in four key areas: institutional resource assessment, learner career trajectory and demand, practitioner buy-in and perceived need, and policy alignment. The resulting curriculum content was then mapped against the IS4NCDs competency framework to ensure alignment and completeness.

This process also surfaced important contextual differences between institutions — for example, stronger methodological expertise at some institutions and deeper clinical context at others — which informed how content is balanced and where each institution's contribution is most valuable.

Cross-Cutting Themes: Equity, Sustainability, and South-to-South Learning

Several themes recurred throughout the day's discussions, reflecting the programme's broader values and commitments.

Equity was raised repeatedly — not only in terms of curriculum content (ensuring that learning addresses the needs of marginalised populations), but also in terms of access to the programmes themselves. Participants emphasised the importance of avoiding financial or logistical barriers that would exclude the very practitioners the programme seeks to reach. The observation that previous online pilot offerings attracted hundreds of applicants was taken as evidence of strong demand — and as a reminder that design choices around format, cost, and scheduling have real equity implications.

Long-term sustainability was a major concern. The consensus view was that the pilot phase serves not only project deliverables but also the long-term goal of embedding these modules into the regular offerings of each consortium university. Some institutions are already planning to integrate short-course participants into existing postgraduate classes, creating a pathway that serves both short-course and degree-seeking students simultaneously.

South-to-South collaboration was highlighted as a distinctive and underappreciated strength of the programme. While much global health capacity building flows from North to South, IS4NCDs deliberately fosters peer-to-peer exchange between Zambia and South Africa — building shared knowledge and institutional relationships that will outlast the project itself.

Looking Ahead

The discussions concluded with a clear sense of direction. Operational decisions have been made — or are close to being finalised — across all module tiers. The curriculum content for the core modules has been presented and is undergoing refinement through competency and learning outcome mapping. The next steps involve deeper content-level discussions for all modules, finalising roadmaps for each institutional pilot, and continuing the parallel accreditation processes.

The IS4NCDs consortium is demonstrating what becomes possible when institutions across countries and disciplines work together with a shared commitment to relevance, equity, and rigour. The modules being designed are not just courses — they are an investment in a generation of implementation scientists equipped to address the NCD challenge in Africa and beyond.

4 May 2026

We're thrilled to share key takeaways from our workshop, presented by Lisa Pfadenhauer, Marie Therese Schultes, and Judith van de Kamp on Day 1 of the IS4NCDs Regional Consortium Meeting, focusing on the didactic foundation and competency framework for Implementation Science in Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs). This vital work, supported by the European Union's Erasmus+ programme, is paving the way for more effective NCD interventions, especially in Low- and Middle-Income Countries (LMICs).

Our workshop delved into several crucial areas:

• Principles of Learning: We explored crafting reality-based, context-sensitive learning environments that foster diversity, trust, and critical reflection.
• Learning Orientation: The discussion emphasized cultivating systems thinking, critical analysis, and the ability to map relevant disciplines and stakeholders for integrated approaches.
• Competency Framework: A robust framework was presented, developed through extensive research and contextualization. This framework identifies crucial skills for NCD implementation science expertise, research, communication, and interpersonal collaboration.

The IS4NCDs project aims to synthesize existing implementation science (IS) competency frameworks for applying them to NCD prevention and care in LMICs. It also seeks to provide an evidence base for capacity building in implementation science education for non-communicable disease prevention and management in Africa.

The development of this framework involved a rigorous methodology:

• A rapid review of the literature describing IS competency frameworks.
• Searches were conducted in MEDLINE, EMBASE, and PsycInfo.
• Screening of 8888 abstracts and 117 full-texts in Rayyan.
• Inductive coding of competencies in MAXQDA.

A recent survey study, involving professionals from 22 LMICs, provided invaluable insights into the prioritization, appropriateness, feasibility, and acceptability of our competency framework. We identified key barriers such as funding and resource constraints, and facilitators including leadership, organizational commitment, and capacity building.

The framework consolidates competencies into 5 clusters, each with 3-5 sub-competencies. These clusters include:

• Implementation Science Expertise: Define & understand IS, describe, select & apply IS TMFs, incorporate health equity in IS, apply organizational & policy knowledge.
• General Research Competencies: Identify & prioritize needs & problems, acquire & manage research projects, search for, synthesize & appraise evidence, evaluate implementation outcomes systematically, scientifically assess & analyze data.
• Implementation Research Competencies: Design implementation research studies, identify & understand contextual factors, select & apply de-implementation strategies, monitor outcomes & tailor strategies/interventions, apply principles of sustainability & scale-up.
• Communication & Dissemination Competencies: Communicate clearly & appropriately, build capacity for research & implementation, disseminate research findings.
• Interpersonal Competencies: Apply leadership & teamwork skills, engage & co-create with community members, collaborate interprofessionally & build sustainable partnerships.

To further contextualize the competency framework for NCD prevention & care in LMICs and determine the relevance of competencies for different target groups, the next steps include:

• Focus group discussions with NCD experts.
• A survey study with interest holders with different roles in NCD management in LMICs.