Samoa's Commission of Inquiry into merging the National Health Service and the Ministry of Health has set aside a management structure for a unified entity proposed by a task force and recommended a new one.
The cover of the commission's report. Photo: RNZ Pacific / Autagavai Tipi Autagavai
As part of its recommendation, the commission wants an executive midwife nurse to be one of the directors of the new entity.
The office holder should have the capacity to assist and support clinical leaders in deployment and professional development, it said.
The commission's findings said the task force's proposed management structure was overly complex and lacked clarity regarding clinical and administrative positions as well as systems of accountability.
The commission also found a merger was necessary due to miscommunication between top level management at the ministry and the service.
"In the course of this inquiry we have seen a health system which will leave our population in Savaii and beyond Apia without access to registered doctors and the public health services which they need," the commission said.
The commission's proposed structure is understood to have been sent by cabinet to the ministry and the service for consideration.
This is ahead of a meeting next Tuesday with the prime minister who said the merger would happen later this month.