UBOMI BUHLE: Understanding Birth Outcomes from Mothers and Infants, Building Healthcare by Linking Exposures: Pregnancy Exposure Registry Project
UBOMI BUHLE MANAGEMENT COMMITTEE: TERMS OF REFERENCE
Purpose
The role of the UBOMI BUHLE Management Committee (UBMC) is to provide strategic oversight of the project ensuring relevance and sustainability of the project initiatives while building sound relationships with key stakeholders. In addition, this committee will monitor achievement of project deliverables and strategically advise on how to mitigate risks of not meeting these deliverables through adaptive programming.
Specific Responsibilities
The specific responsibilities of the UBMC include:
- To ensure that all project deliverables are met within the proposed timelines
- To regularly evaluate progress made in the various sub-objectives and explicitly stated deliverables
- To provide guidance on strategic adaptive programming approaches as needed
- To ensure optimal engagement with key stakeholders
- To provide guidance and support in terms of ensuring sustainability of the project
Membership and Composition
Members of the UBMC will include local and international policy-makers, scientific experts, members of relevant national policy committees (e.g. National Committee for the Confidential Enquiry into Maternal Deaths) including senior members of the National Department of Health (Maternal and Child Health Services, HIV/AIDS directorate). Members of the UBMC will not be involved directly in the UBOMI BUHLE Pregnancy Exposure Registry (UBPER) activities but will include individuals with expertise in maternal and child health policy, drug policy, regulatory sciences, ethics and health informatics. Additional engagement with other experts or decision-makers will be sought on an ad-hoc basis.
All members will be required to sign an annual declaration of interest as well as a declaration of interest form at each meeting.
The UBMC meetings will be open to the project collaborators and investigators including site leads who may be required to make presentations during the meetings or provide any clarification needed. The UBOMI BUHLE project manager and project principle investigators (PIs) will serve as the rapporteurs and executors of UBMC decisions. Appointment of the UBMC will be for 2 years or until funding for the project expires, whichever comes first. The Technical Advisory Committee and site PIs will be jointly responsible for selecting, appointing and replacing all members, including rotation of the Chair as required.
Membership of the UBMC may be terminated for any of the following reasons:
- Mutual agreement
- A lack of professionalism involving, for example, a breach of confidentiality or repeated failure to conduct assigned tasks
- A new conflict of interest or a significant change in conflict of interest.
Meetings, operational procedures and quorum
The UBMC will convene 2 to 4 times a year either by teleconference or videoconference call. The meetings will take approximately half a day or less. The UBOMI BUHLE project manager will be responsible for planning the meetings, preparing the agenda (in consultation with the PIs and chair of the UBMC), taking minutes and circulating them to committee members and ensuring that a running list of action items is maintained. Approval of the minutes will be the first item on the agenda at the subsequent meeting of the UBMC.
The chair of the committee will be responsible for chairing the meeting, setting the agenda, keeping the discussions focussed and in time. Administrative support will be provided by the offices of the site. Any supporting documents for the meeting will be prepared by the project manager and sent out electronically no less than one week before the meeting date. The project manager will take written minutes of the meetings’ discussions and recommendations. These minutes will be reviewed and approved by the Committee at the next meeting of the UBMC.
The committee will be considered quorate when at least two thirds of the committee members are present. Decisions will be made by consensus and any dissenting opinions will be recorded together with reasons.
Communication
The project manager and/or the PIs will be responsible for communicating the recommendations and requests of the UBMC to the Technical Advisory Committee and the Joint Project Team (PIs, project manager, site leads and co-investigators).
Version history
Version # |
Implemented
By |
Revision
Date |
Approved
By |
Approval
Date |
Reason |
1.1 |
Ushma Mehta |
5 August 2020 |
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N/A |
1.2 |
Diane Lavies |
23 June 2022 |
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Removed the word “National”. Minor grammatical and other minor edits |
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