Egypt’s General Authority for Healthcare Accreditation and Regulation (GAHAR) accredited 945 healthcare facilities across 26 governorates and conducted more than 2,100 regulatory visits during the 2025/26 financial year, the Ministry of Health and Population said.
The figures were presented during a meeting between Health Minister Khaled Abdel Ghaffar and GAHAR Chairman Ahmed Taha to review the authority’s annual report as Egypt continues to expand its Universal Health Insurance System.
Abdel Ghaffar said the success of healthcare accreditation should be measured not only through numerical indicators, but also by whether patients experience tangible improvements in the quality of care.
During the year, the authority conducted around 600 assessment visits and implemented 798 technical support and preparation programmes benefiting 18,016 trainees. This brought the total number of healthcare professionals trained through the authority’s training centre to around 34,000, in cooperation with 12 universities, according to the ministry.
Abdel Ghaffar directed the authority to extend these programmes to newly appointed doctors and nursing staff to ensure they are equipped with the necessary knowledge and skills to meet healthcare quality and safety standards.
The authority also registered 33,233 healthcare professionals during the year and reviewed the designs of 26 government healthcare projects, bringing the cumulative number of projects assessed to ensure safe design to 590.
In addition, GAHAR collected 168,591 patient-experience questionnaires and 18,615 surveys from healthcare providers. Abdel Ghaffar called for the causes of patient dissatisfaction to be analysed and for the findings of the surveys to be translated into concrete measures to improve healthcare services.
The International Society for Quality in Health Care (ISQua) renewed GAHAR’s institutional accreditation for four years. Meanwhile, the authority’s 2026 standards for specialised medical centres, private clinics, and community pharmacies received international accreditation, achieving a 99.6% assessment score, according to the ministry.
The standards include requirements covering artificial intelligence, telemedicine, clinical governance, medical tourism, sustainability, and green healthcare facilities, in addition to updated provisions related to patient safety, surgery, anaesthesia, medication, and infection control.
Medical Professions Risk Compensation Fund
Separately, Abdel Ghaffar chaired the seventh meeting of the board of the Medical Professions Risk Compensation Fund to review compensation for deaths and cases of total or partial disability linked to healthcare work, as well as the fund’s financial position and investment plans.
The board also discussed relocating the fund’s headquarters to the Labour Ministry in December and proposed cooperation with the Ministry of Health and Population, the Egyptian Health Council, and the Supreme Council of University Hospitals.
Abdel Ghaffar stressed that the fund’s spending should focus on areas that provide direct benefits to healthcare workers and contribute to reducing occupational risks.
The ministry did not disclose the fund’s total revenues or balances, or the value of compensation paid through the end of August.
