To reduce maternal morbidity, mortality and improve neonatal health, government has focused on improving access and supply of maternal health services. Despite these efforts, maternal morbidity and mortality remain a major public health problem in Uganda. This study explores the factors and challenges experienced in utilizing ANC and choosing a delivery place in order to inform the implementation of a proposed intervention aimed at improving access to maternal delivery services.
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This article seeks to identify characteristics associated with use of skilled birth attendants where health services exist in Afghanistan. It is based on a cross-sectional study in all 33 provinces in 2004.
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This article identifies factors associated with service quality provided by agencies implementing a basic package of health services in Afghanistan and is based on a cross-sectional survey of outpatient health facilities, health workers, patients and caretakers.
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This article identifies factors associated with client perceptions of the quality of primary care services in Afghanistan through a cross-sectional survey of outpatient health facilities, health workers, patients and caretakers.
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In this paper, we focus on financial protection in rural China, where 745 million–57% of the Chinese people–reside (National Bureau of Statistics of China, 2006). First, we illustrate the degree of financial protection that rural residents have after a series of reforms and changes since 1978. Then we review the current rural health insurance reforms as well as the results from the pilot programs. We conclude with recommendations for future policies and programs.
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A team from Ibadan University undertook a scoping study in 12 local government areas (LGAs) in three states to explore the malaria treatment market and the role of PMVs, and to look at ways to improve malaria treatment.
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This policy brief describes the experiences of a three-way partnership in the Basic Health Services Project and explores lessons for partnership-building elsewhere.
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China’s rural health system has experienced major problems in adapting to the emerging market economy. The central government has recognised that it needs to take action to ensure more equitable access to services. This policy briefing paper summarises lessons from a ten year project that piloted strategies for addressing these problems in 97 poor counties, home to 46.78 million people.
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This research brief focuses on the health-seeking behaviour of the people in Chakaria, a rural area in Bangladesh. Information was collected from 1,000 households during February 2007 on the type of illnesses the villagers suffered from during the two weeks preceding the survey and their associated health seeking behavior
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Today, scientific and technological advancements, coupled with growing international and philanthropic investment, are making strides in addressing the “supply-side” challenges of immunization. Addressing the “demand side” challenges assumes relatively greater importance for expanding immunization coverage.
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In considering African health care practice, it is usual to draw strong distinctions between biomedical and traditional practices, and between public and private health institutions. Whilst distinctions between traditional and biomedical, and between public and private medicine make sense from the vantage point of health professionals, we question how far these distinctions are pertinent in shaping health-seeking behaviour given experience of them. This paper argues that other distinctions are becoming far more important to African therapeutic landscapes to the ways that people evaluate the salience of different health providers to their problems.
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The paper reviews the state of alternative approaches to regulation of health services in India, using consumer and market based approaches, as well as multi-actor and collaborative approaches.
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Combining a case study approach with a general discussion of the issues, this paper attempts to assess the potential benefits of a diverse range of ICT innovations and some of the constraints they will need to overcome.
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This paper is concerned with how poor populations can obtain access to trusted, competent knowledge and services in increasingly pluralistic health systems where unregulated markets for health knowledge and services dominate.
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This paper explores the implications of the increasing role of informal as well as formal markets in the health systems of many low and middle-income countries. It focuses on institutional arrangements for making the benefits of expert medical knowledge widely available in the face of the information asymmetries that characterise health care.
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The purpose of this Special Issue is to stimulate innovative thinking about health system development in low-income and transition countries. In this introduction, we set out why future health systems will probably look very different and why it is particularly important to explore the possibilities now.
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Three key activities were undertaken by FHS during the initial phase of this five-year project. First, key considerations in strengthening evidence-policy linkages in health system research were developed by FHS researchers through workshops and electronic communications. Four key considerations in strengthening evidence-policy linkages are postulated: development context; research characteristics; decision-making processes; and stakeholder engagement. Second, these four considerations were applied to research proposals in each of the six countries to highlight features in the research plans that potentially strengthen the research-policy interface and opportunities for improvement. Finally, the utility of the approach for setting research priorities in health policy and systems research was reflected upon.
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The specific objectives of this research are to examine the socioeconomic differentials of maternity care seeking, and to determine whether accessibility of health services reduces the socioeconomic differentials in maternity care seeking.
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Using the examples of front-line health providers and health insurance, this paper discusses how China and India's different approaches have emerged from their own historical and political contexts and have led to different ways to address the main regulatory questions concerning quality of care, value for money, social agreement, and accountability.
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The goal of this paper is to examine the ways in which public and private sectors can cooperate to improve the quality and accessibility of primary healthcare (PHC) to the poor in developing countries.
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