The 2025 Forum
Who was in the room Reach, participation and the professions represented across the eight sessions.
“Healthcare will not realize its full potential unless change-making becomes an intrinsic part of everyone’s job, every day, in all parts of the system.”
Attendance at a glance
The forum ran across eight sessions, in person in Nairobi and online across the continent.
Attendee countries
21
African countries
Broader Pan-African reach: at least 10 African countries were represented, spanning West, East, Southern and North Africa.
Participants
800+
Participants across the forum
- 481virtual
- 127in person
Professions represented
Audience by role. Clinicians made up close to two thirds of everyone who attended.
- 64.5%CliniciansDoctors, nurses, clinical officers, midwives and students
- 23.2%Allied healthPharmacists, lab technologists, public health, nutritionists, counsellors and radiographers
- 7.2%Community and otherCommunity health volunteers and unspecified or other roles
- 5.1%Administration and managementFacility and programme administration and management
Total = 100%
Top countries represented
The countries that sent the largest delegations to the 2025 forum.
- Kenya
- Nigeria
- Philippines
- Uganda
- Zambia
How far the region still has to go
A 2024 global progress report scored patient safety systems out of 10 and placed Africa in the “basic” red zone. Every dimension sits well below the score of 7 that marks an advanced system.
“Advanced” threshold — 7 out of 10
Incident reporting and learning systems
3.3Digital technologies
3.1Patient safety information systems
3.0Surveillance systems
2.0Research programmes
1.5
010
- 32%of countries had adopted some form of medical incident reporting system, according to the 2024 global progress report.
- Under 15%availability of designated people or structures to handle patient safety reporting in low- and middle-income settings.
Source: Session 3 — From silence to safety, drawing on the 2024 global progress report on the Global Patient Safety Action Plan.
What the projects changed
Twenty-six posters were submitted from Nigeria, Kenya, Malawi and Cameroon, and 14 were presented live. These are the projects that published a measured result.
- Before
- After
- Client satisfactionKahawa West Health Centre, Kenya — 5S and value stream mapping35%→75%
- PrEP client experienceLikoni Sub-County Hospital, Kenya — four months44%→90%
0%100%
- Measured on their own scales
- Patient turnaround timeKahawa West Health Centre, Kenya120 min→45 min
- Facilities entering the county quality awardsNairobi County, Kenya0 in 2017→100+ in 2018
- New HIV-exposed infant seroconversionsKihara Sub-County Hospital, KenyaOver half the sub-county’s positives→None for over a year
- Cardiology waiting timeGeneral Hospital Odan, Lagos, Nigeria4-hour average; a 25% cut targeted, 15% achieved within weeks
- Preeclampsia and eclampsia protocol adherenceFederal Medical Centre Epe, Lagos, Nigeria55% at baseline, improved over nine months; no end figure published
Source: Session 7 — Celebrating frontline innovation. Figures are as reported by the presenting teams.