Improving cause of death reporting
With a few exceptions, medical doctors in South Africa do not routinely receive training in the medical certification of cause of death, and do not understand how these data are processed and used for public health policy. A large percentage (approximately 44%) of all deaths certified by clinicians are insufficiently specified resulting in unusable data.
Why register for this free online course?
Register now and equip yourself to:
- Understand the importance of correct certification of cause of death
- Understand your role as doctor in producing reliable causes of death statistics
- Correctly complete a death certificate
- Know when to refer to Forensic Pathology Services for a post mortem investigation
- Receive a certificate of completion and CPD points (6 General and 2 Ethics) recognised by the Health Professions Council of SA
- Play a crucial role in improving the quality of mortality statistics in South Africa
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What Others Say
“The part of the training that really impacted me was understanding the importance of correctly filling in the medical death certificate as it impacts the whole of our population.”
“Seeing how statistics obtained from cause of death certificates are used to forecast planning and budgets for health programmes and interventions, suddenly made this somewhat inconvenient task of filling in a death certificate, now one of vital importance.”
“I am now motivated to fill in the death certificate accurately to continue the respectful care toward a patient, knowing it will best serve the individual as well as the population.”
Free online course for medical doctors and students to report cause of death
Acknowledgements
Departments of Paediatrics and Child Health and Internal Medicine, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand.
