The Ghana Health Service (GHS) and PharmAccess Foundation have signed an MoU to institutionalise the SafeCare quality improvement system across all public health facilities in Ghana.

The signing ceremony, held at the GHS Headquarters in Accra, marks a defining step in Ghana’s commitment to delivering safe, high-quality, and accountable healthcare for all.

Over the past three years, PharmAccess has collaborated with GHS to implement SafeCare in selected pilot facilities and regions.

These pilot facilities have demonstrated significant improvements in management systems, patient safety, and clinical outcomes.

This new agreement transitions the initiative from pilot phase to nationwide implementation, ensuring that healthcare facilities at all levels - regional, district, and community - are systematically assessed, trained, and supported using a unified, data-driven framework.

SafeCare, an ISQuaEEA-accredited system, evaluates facilities on a five-level scale and supports them through continuous improvement cycles.

The model has already delivered measurable results in Bono East and Savannah Regions, where pilot facilities reported stronger leadership engagement, improved clinical processes, and enhanced patient satisfaction.

“This MoU represents more than another partnership; it is a turning point in how Ghana defines progress in healthcare,” said Dr Maxwell Antwi, Country Director of PharmAccess Ghana.

“SafeCare is not a program; it is a system, a service-wide framework that brings structure, accountability, and measurable improvement to how care is delivered. It ensures that quality becomes the culture, not the exception.”

Dr Antwi emphasised that quality, not just access, remains Ghana’s next great frontier in healthcare. Citing global data, he noted that over five million deaths occur annually in low- and middle-income countries due to poor quality care—surpassing deaths caused by lack of access.

He explained that SafeCare directly addresses this challenge by providing transparent, evidence-based metrics to drive decision-making and resource allocation.

“Access without quality is like giving someone contaminated food to eat when hungry,” Dr Antwi said.

“We must match the government’s expansion of access through NHIS and Free Primary Healthcare with equal commitment to quality, safety, and patient trust.”

The MoU builds on substantial capacity investments. In 2024, twenty GHS staff members became internationally certified SafeCare assessors through rigorous training facilitated by PharmAccess.

GHS now boasts 20 internationally certified assessors and has conducted over 180 assessments across 140 facilities nationwide, and is supporting quality improvement in all these facilities, an achievement that underscores Ghana’s growing local ownership of healthcare quality systems.

Speaking at the event, Dr Samuel Kaba Akoriyea, Director-General of GHS, hailed the partnership as a practical roadmap for action rather than rhetoric.

“We cannot talk about Free Primary Healthcare or the ‘Mahama Cares’ initiative without guaranteeing quality,” he stated.

“Implementation begins immediately in the Greater Accra Region, where we will train regional ‘Trainers of Trainers’ to cascade SafeCare across all levels, from regional hospitals to CHPS compounds.

"For the first time, patients themselves will be empowered through a community scorecard system to give real-time feedback on the quality of care they receive.”

Dr Akoriyea reaffirmed that GHS is committed to embedding SafeCare into its national performance reviews, accreditation systems, and NHIS credentialing processes, in collaboration with the Health Facilities Regulatory Agency (HeFRA).

PharmAccess will continue providing technical assistance, digital tools, and assessor certification as GHS leads national implementation through its Institutional Care Division.

The MoU signals a new era in Ghana’s healthcare landscape, one where quality is measurable, transparent, and integral to system performance.

Both organisations envision a future where every patient, regardless of location, can confidently access care that is safe, standardised, and trusted.

In attendance at the signing ceremony were Dr Lawrence Ofori-Boadu, Director of the Institutional Care Division, GHS; Dr Robert Amesiya, Acting Regional Director, Greater Accra; Hammond N. Sarkwah, Deputy Director of ICT, GHS; Mabel Kissiwaa Asafo, Acting Director of Health Promotion, GHS; and Ms Bonifacia Benefo Agyei, SafeCare Country Director, PharmAccess Ghana.