Household level
Students work at the level of the compound, not the ward.
Flagship Programme
COBES
Health and allied health students learn where most Ghanaians actually meet the health system: in the village, the compound and the district clinic — not the teaching hospital.
Health and allied health students learn where most Ghanaians actually meet the health system: in the village, the compound and the district clinic — not the teaching hospital.
Community-Based Education and Service puts health students into rural communities early and repeatedly, rather than once at the end. They run household surveys, support clinic days, trace the reasons a family is not immunising a child, and report what they find back to the district health directorate.
The point is not free labour. It is that a clinician trained only in a teaching hospital will spend a career surprised by the conditions most of their patients live in. COBES makes those conditions ordinary long before graduation.
What students do
Alongside district health staff
Placements are arranged with the district health directorate and its clinics.
Findings go back
What students record is reported to the health authorities who can use it.
What it achieves
Clinicians who understand rural practice
Graduates who are not meeting a village for the first time on posting.
Better local health information
Communities that were not well described in the data become visible.
How to take part
COBES placements are arranged through the relevant school and coordinated with the directorate. Students are notified of blocks and locations in advance.
District health directorates and clinics interested in hosting students should contact DCROP.
Partner With Us
Let’s work together to create sustainable communities through teaching, research and innovation.