Knowledge sharing for healthcare and medicine in developing countries: Opportunities, issues, and experiences

Knowledge sharing has always been used as a platform for cross-pollination of ideas and innovations in a bid to improve and enhance performance thereby increasing competitiveness and responsiveness both in organizations and individual levels. Healthcare systems are not an exception. However, for knowledge sharing to take place there is need for certain factors to be noted and addressed such as the individual, organizational and technological. Further, knowledge sharing goes hand in hand with knowledge management and must become part of the strategic fabric of organizations. This chapter focuses on knowledge sharing by health professionals in healthcare and medicine in developing countries. The chapter covers knowledge management and its link with knowledge sharing; the various methods of knowledge sharing in healthcare; factors that make knowledge sharing an important strategic move for healthcare organizations; and factors and issues that affect or determine knowledge sharing behavior. Finally, a literature search for examples of knowledge sharing in developing or low and middle-income countries was conducted and the results are presented. The chapter shows that developing countries have recognized the value of knowledge sharing in healthcare systems and there are tangible signs that this is going to shape cross-pollination of ideas and innovations in the health systems in the foreseeable future.