Tag: community health
© HPI A training approach for community health volunteers increased skilled birth attendance rates in six rural districts in Zambia by 63 percent from baseline over a two-year period. The training approach was developed for adult community health volunteers operating in a low literacy context. The UK aid-funded Mobilising Access to Maternal Health Services in Zambia (MAMaZ)… Read more
This spring, when my team from the Ebola Response Anthropology Platform evaluated Community-Based Ebola Care Centres (CCCs) in Sierra Leone, one thing we constantly heard complaints about was human-resource management. Residents of the communities where the Centres were located grumbled about favouritism: well-paying jobs in the Centres were given to friends and family of the… Read more
The recent call for more of a focus on people centred health systems and the devastating effects of Ebola in West Africa have brought communities to the forefront of the attention of decision makers. REACHOUT, along with our sister consortia ReBUILD and COUNTDOWN, are part of a growing group of health systems researchers who are trying to provide… Read more
Community-based health insurance has been associated with increased hospitalisation in low-income settings, but with limited analysis of the illnesses for which claims are submitted. A review of claims submitted to VimoSEWA, an inpatient insurance scheme in Gujarat, India, found that fever, diarrhoea and hysterectomy, the latter at a mean age of 37 years, were the… Read more
In the field of health systems research there have been some promising moves towards acknowledging and celebrating the role of people and communities. Most recently the Cape Town Statement from the Global Symposium on Health Systems Research provides a political agenda for future work in which it is acknowledged that: “The drive towards universal health… Read more
Current levels of human resources are not enough to meet the health Millennium Development Goals and Universal Health Coverage. There is growing recognition that human resources beyond a trained health workforce can be considered as ‘assets’ and be utilised to achieve these goals. Community Health Workers (CHWs) and other Front-Line Health Workers can provide a… Read more