Our corporate social investment (CSI)

OUR APPROACH TO CSI

At Life Healthcare, we believe that we can make people's lives better through projects that enhance their life experience and by facilitating brighter futures in an enabling fashion. We drive strategically relevant CSI programmes that complement shortfalls in public healthcare services and training in South Africa, both at a national level and with community involvement at a grassroots level.

OUR CSI GOVERNANCE

CSI INVESTMENT

OUR FOCUS AREAS

The areas we focus on when considering programmes to support are:

• Community upliftment
• Health
• Education

These focus areas align with our purpose of making life better. Life Healthcare's CSI programmes continue to provide value to the communities in which we operate, as well as those communities in which our employees reside. We offer monetary contributions and drive sustainable change through community upliftment, health-related, and education projects.

Community upliftment

The Life Sizanani employee involvement programme is one of our most inspiring CSI projects and has been in existence for over 15 years. Each support function within Life Healthcare adopts and supports a disadvantaged community in an effort to improve their lives in various ways.

Employees and their supporting organisations jointly decide on CSI projects. The 70 ongoing projects have touched the lives of many disadvantaged children.

Health

Our supporting specialists have shown their desire to improve the lives of indigent patients. Probono surgery was provided to patients that could not afford treatment during 2019, following the increased requests from supporting specialists. In total, 28 602 patients were assisted in 2019 at no cost or reduced cost to the patient.

We continued to provide cataract surgery and eye-care services to indigent patients this year. This resulted in a significant outcome from our partnership with the SANCB. An additional mobile clinic and two cataract tours (screening and cataract surgeries) were sponsored during 2019 to increase the reach of eye-care services to peri-urban and rural areas in Limpopo and Mpumalanga.

Education

At Life Healthcare we know that building skills changes lives. In addition to our usual focus on educational initiatives, we have increased our focus on the training of sub-specialists, and included more persons with disabilities in these training initiatives.

Life Healthcare has partnered with the SANCB Optima College, which provides vocational and life skills training for visually impaired students. The college is accredited by the Services Seta at a National Qualifications Framework (NQF) level 2 in the following courses:

• Introduction to computers
• Contact Centre and Support
• Business Administration Services and Braille Literacy

Life Healthcare renewed its funding to the Optima College for a period of at least one year with an option to renew annually as a result of the successful partnership in the prior year.

A second area we have identified in the realm of education that actively addresses our skills shortage concerns, is the intense need for bursaries to support students studying towards becoming doctors – in particular, specialists and sub-specialists. We have partnered with the Specialist and Sub-Specialist fund, previously called the Colleges of Medicine of South Africa, to provide bursaries to a number of medical students at South African universities.

We continue with the Public Health Enhancement Fund (PHEF) projects which aim to build human capital to address the challenge of HIV/Aids, and to develop leadership capacity within the public health system. These include:

• The national health scholars programme which offers two-year scholarships for South African Master's and PhD students pursuing research in clinical health systems and biomedical sciences in the fields of HIV/Aids and tuberculosis with 60 Masters students and 47 PhD students that have benefitted from the programme to date.
• Support for medical students is offered, with 22 undergraduate medical students supported by PHEF. 60 undergraduate medical students have qualified in FY2019 and all are currently employed.
• A knowledge-management hub which is a web-based teaching and learning platform that offers learning resources to hospital managers.

International projects and initiatives

Community involvement

Through Scanmed, we support the Mam Marzenie Foundation. This non-governmental organisation assists children and young people with severe and life-limiting conditions to fulfil their personal dreams.

Health

Preventative screenings were performed free of charge at 33 (2018: 33) locations for more than 540 (2018: 540) indigent patients. The screenings include tests relating to prostate disease, lung and eye disease, orthopaedics, gynaecology and urology, dietetics, and diabetology.

Education

We provide support to the AGH University of Science and Technology in Poland, through an adaptation programme and various cost-free preventative medical interventions for students and university staff.

Our partnership with the fifth edition of the Leadership Programme for Health Care continues this year. This programme is organised by the Leslaw A. Paga Foundation, an educational support organisation, and is aimed at medical students in Poland. This year's programme was attended by more than 600 students, with three ultimately incorporated as trainees.

In Alliance Medical, we have a university partnership model in the UK and Ireland with partnerships further developing at multiple universities. This includes placement programmes for undergraduate and postgraduate radiography students, the provision of lecturing support, interview skills training and graduate radiographer opportunities.

Partnerships with 11 universities are in place, with 20 graduates appointed during 2019.

In the UK 32 colleagues enrolled in apprenticeship programmes.

Our apprenticeship programme in the UK continues with colleagues undertaking apprenticeships ranging from degree level management qualifications through to clinical administration qualifications.