Onyebuchi Ezigbo in Abuja
The Federal Ministry of Health and Social Welfare and Nigeria Implementation Science Alliance (NISA) have expressed the need to adopt the application of implementation science to improve health outcomes in Nigeria.
Speaking at the 11th Annual Nigerian Implementation Science Alliance (NISA) Scientific Conference, Director and Head of Planning and Research in the Federal Ministry of Health and Social Welfare, Dr, John Ovurouye, said the ministry had embarked on several innovative programmes aimed at improving healthcare delivery in the country.
As part of the federal government’s efforts to integrate research and innovation in the health sector development drive, Ovurouye said the ministry was working on a collaborative arrangement, which will see key policy makers in the ministry engage in exchange programmes with those in the universities and research-based organisations.
According to him, such arrangement will be in form of sabbatical engagements where Directors in the health ministry and their counterparts in the universities, especially those that have distinguished themselves in the area of research, will swap their services so as to bring their experiences to bear on policy and programme implementation.
While welcoming participants at the conference, Chair of NISA Trustee Board, Professor Echezona Ezeanolue, said the major aim of the platform was to help develop a crop of highly competent Nigerians in the field of research and innovation, who could hold their head high in implementation science.
Currently, he said, “The university is training people that have no experience because they’re not working there.
“We want to connect both of them. We want that person that is training in the university, in the first year of their PhD, to take eight weeks to go to the malaria programme and stay with them and learn how to do it. In the second year, he goes there and spends 12 weeks.
“In the final year, he goes there and spends six months. By the time he finishes, the malaria programme is hiring him already. So, we are connecting these two.
“We are not doing anything new. What we are doing here is different. It’s connecting them so that they’re not working in silos. The university is doing tests that nobody reads. It’s between information science and information practice. And that’s really what we’re trying to do”.
Speaking on the theme of the conference, “From Evidence to Impact: Advancing Implementation Science for Sustainable Development,” Echezona said governments needed to collaborate with research instructions and other organisations that promote science and innovation in order to ensure policies and programmes were efficiently implemented on a sustainable basis.
The board chair said NISA intended to sponsor Nigerian scholars who will specialise in implementation science and how to use it in policy and programme implementation
He stated, “What we want to be able to do is to bring the world to help us train 10 PhD-trained implementation scientists that is going to feed our health system.”
Echezona said, “Both our implementing partners, both our universities, both our government establishments and our national programmes. But to do that, we’re not going to do it alone.
“We can’t do it alone. We need our universities. We need our global partners. We need our implementation partners. We need people who have seen how things can be done differently. We have to do our PhD programme differently.
“Not that we are producing people who don’t have a job. We are producing people whom Nigerians want to hire.”
Earlier, in his welcome remarks, Executive Director of KNCV and the chairman of Local Organising Committee for the conference, Dr. Bethrand Odume, said the NISA Scientific Conference had evolved into an important platform for researchers, policymakers, programme implementers, healthcare professionals, development partners, communities, and other stakeholders to exchange knowledge, interrogate evidence, and advance the application of implementation science to improve health outcomes in Nigeria and beyond.
Odume stated that the focus of KNCV was on HIV and child health. He said the NISA platform provided opportunity to continuously “bridge the gap between what we do as implementation partners and the public sector and academia and the research institution”.
He said, “We all know why we talk about research and implementation services. It helps us to solve the problem within the system.”
Odume said the conference had continued to grow over the years, adding that from 22 abstracts presented in 2015, scientific participation had grown substantially over the years.
According to him, “In 2022, 76 abstracts were presented, while submissions increased from 170 in 2023 to 180 in 2024, 282 in 2025 and a record 427 submissions in 2026. Following scientific review, 200 abstracts were accepted for presentation at this year’s conference the highest number in NISA’s history.”
He also said, “The conference attendance has similarly grown, from 408 participants in 2024 to 465 in 2025; and a record expected this year. These trends reflect not simply increasing numbers, but a growing national community generating and applying implementation evidence.”
Odume said the conference spoke directly to the need to move beyond generating evidence to ensuring that evidence led to meaningful and sustained improvements in health and development.
He stated, “As Nigeria continues to strengthen its health systems, advance programme integration, increase country ownership and pursue sustainable financing, the ability to translate evidence into effective policies, programmes and practices have never been more important.”