The USAID | DELIVER PROJECT recently issued three new briefs highlighting its work improving contraceptive security in West and Central Africa. Each brief is available in English and French.

Collaboration with the West African Health Organization (WAHO) to Improve Contraceptive Security summarizes some of the achievements resulting from the project’s strategic partnership with WAHO, and demonstrates how these achievements have led to greater support for contraceptive security.

Health Logistics Students Gain Valuable Quantification Skills discusses the project’s collaboration with the National School of Public Health in Burkina Faso to develop and teach a training course in quantification of health products for the school’s two-year master’s degree program in health logistics.

Early Warning System for Contraceptives in West and Central Africa Improves Supply Availability is an updated project brief that outlines how the Early Warning System for contraceptives has improved the visibility and monitoring of contraceptive stock status, and mitigated critical contraceptive stock imbalances in the project’s 13 target countries.

Together, these three briefs provide an introduction to some of the project’s work in West and Central Africa. For more information, see the West and Central Africa Overview.

Download the briefs:

• Collaboration with the West African Health Organization (WAHO) to Improve Contraceptive Security  
• Collaboration avec l’Organisation Ouest Africaine de la Santé (OOAS) pour Améliorer la Sécurité Contraceptive 

• Health Logistics Students Gain Valuable Quantification Skills
• Des Etudiants en Logistique de Santé Reçoivent des Compétences en Quantification

• Early Warning System for Contraceptives in West and Central Africa Improves Supply Availability
• Le Système d’Alerte Précoce pour les Contraceptifs en Afrique de l’Ouest et du Centre Améliore la Disponibilité des Produits

If you work in a developing country, or know colleagues who work in developing countries and who may be interested in an evidence-based clinical fellowship from the Joanna Briggs Institute, please refer them to the information below. All costs (travel, course fees, conference attendance, accommodation, living expenses) are covered. For a video of past fellows, visit the following link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EkveGgdSJhM

CALL FOR APPLICANTS: The Joanna Briggs Institute Developing Countries Clinical Fellowships 2016

http://joannabriggs.org/developing-country-clinical-fellowships.html

Background

The Joanna Briggs Institute (http://joannabriggs.org/) is an international not-for-profit, research and development centre within the Faculty of Health Sciences at the University of Adelaide, South Australia. Our international collaboration includes more than 70 groups and entities across the world.  Of these, many groups are situated in less-resourced settings such as Myanmar, Philippines, Vietnam, India, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, Botswana and Uganda.

The Joanna Briggs Institute collaborates with these groups where language, technology, geography and finance present significant challenges to the provision of healthcare. We are working with these groups to create an appropriate knowledge base to support health decisions and to make this knowledge readily available in developing countries.

The Joanna Briggs Foundation (http://joannabriggsfoundation.org/) has been established to raise funds that enable health professionals from developing countries to undertake the JBI Clinical Fellowship program. The JBI Evidence-Based Clinical Fellowship Program is a six-month work place, evidence-based, implementation program involving 2 x ten-day intensive training workshops in the Joanna Briggs Institute in Adelaide, and conducting a work place evidence implementation project in the intervening months.

JBI Clinical Fellowship

Applicants must be health professionals currently working in their home country, with access to a clinical setting. They must be able to identify a topic of interest in an area in which they would like to conduct a baseline clinical audit, implement evidence based strategies, and then conduct a follow-up clinical audit aimed at assessing outcomes. Past projects have included topics such as: (see attached examples)

– Improving management of primary postpartum hemorrhage in birthing women

– Hand hygiene practice among healthcare workers in the acute hospital setting

– Diagnosis of tuberculosis in children under five years of age

The Joanna Briggs Institute Clinical Fellowship Program offers participants an opportunity to learn how to:

– Develop and engage in processes to further develop their leadership skills and strengths

– Discuss and describe the effectiveness of current approaches to the implementation of evidence based practice

– Critique current evidence implementation strategies

– Act as an agent of change, conduct clinical audits and develop and implement strategies to implement evidence based practice

– Preparation of a publication and submission to a peer reviewed journal.

It is hoped that by undertaking this course, participants will have the skills and knowledge to improve health outcomes in their regions and to lead others in this important area of health improvement.

Eligibility Criteria

Applicants must possess good English skills (spoken and written), and be prepared to give presentations regarding their project to sponsors and academic staff.  They will be supported by a JBI Research Fellow who will act as a facilitator over the 6 months of the program. Applicants must be a health professional or working in health and have access to a clinical setting. Applicants from Nepal, Myanmar and Cambodia are strongly encouraged to apply.

Funding

This grant will cover travel to and from Adelaide for both the first and second weeks of the Clinical Fellowship Program, and the provision of basic meals and accommodation in the Royal Adelaide Hospital Residential facility. In addition, participants will be able to attend the JBI 20th Anniversary three-day Conference in November 2016.

Dates:

Call for Applications opened: November 2015

Applications close: February 1 2016

Successful applicants notified: March 2016

First intensive training block in Adelaide, South Australia: June 20-29 2016

Second intensive training block in Adelaide, South Australia: November 9-18 2016

How to apply:

Please visit the link below for further details and the application form.

http://joannabriggs.org/developing-country-clinical-fellowships.html

Kind Regards,

Zac

Dr Zachary Munn

Director of Transfer Science

Learning and Teaching Coordinator

The Joanna Briggs Institute

The University of Adelaide

T: +61 8 8313 3642 | F: +61 8 8313 4881

W: www.joannabriggs.org | www.adelaide.edu.au

I would like to bring to your attention a new free online course available via FutureLearn. It is called Designing E-learning for Health and is run by the University of Nottingham.

Here is a brief description:

ABOUT THE COURSE: Healthcare is a vast and constantly changing global sector. We all have a stake in it, so it is vital that both professionals and patients not only have access to accurate information, but also to the stories and experiences of real people.

Translate real-life experiences into effective e-learning

As educators, we know that bringing these voices to life in e-learning will make it more effective, but this also poses challenges:

How do we translate real-life experiences into e-learning?

How can our e-learning tell powerful stories?

What methods can we use to design high quality and reusable e-learning resources?

And how can we best get our concepts and ideas across to multiple audiences?

It starts in February 2016 and more information is available here:

https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/e-learning-health?utm_source=FL_DB&utm_medium=crm&utm_campaign=17_11_2015_FL_newsletter&utm_content=text

Best Wishes

Deborah Jackson

HIFA profile: Deborah Jackson is the HIFA Country Representative Coordinator and is based in Finstock, Oxfordshire, UK.

I have the pleasure to announce that my TED Talk organised at LSHTM is now online. In this Talk, I explain that it is important to distinguish between the complicated and complex. I introduce three key elements: information, decisions and social networks that allow people to respond more quickly in changing environments and allow health systems to thrive.

I hope you enjoy it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HXjGXe7bY28

Kind regards

Karl Blanchet

Lecturer in Health Systems Research

Public Health in Humanitarian Crises

London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine

Phone: 0044 2079588392

Mobile: 0044 7815797906

Room 324, Tavistock Place

http://www.lshtm.ac.uk/aboutus/people/blanchet.karl

Dear colleagues

WONCA ANNUAL REPORT – JULY 2014 to JUNE 2015 

We have pleasure in announcing publication of the latest WONCA Annual Report, covering the period from July 2014 to June 2015.  Inevitably this report can only provide a snapshot of the huge amount of work that is carried out by WONCA team and our members around the world. The report is available to download in PDF version from our website. 

We hope that you find this report useful and make it available to as many of your individual members as possible.

With best regards

Dr Garth Manning

Chief Executive Officer

Please find some information to add to our entry on the HIFA Directory.

The Patient Information Forum (PIF) is the UK membership organisation and network for people working in, and involved with, health and care information and support.  

The Patient Information Forum is committed to improving the healthcare experience of patients and the public. We do this by supporting individuals and organisations to provide clearly communicated, evidence based health and care information and support, which is accessible and developed with its users.

Website: www.pifonline.org.uk

Twitter:  twitter.com/PiFonline

Many thanks

Kind regards

Nicole

—

Nicole Naylor | Joint Head of Operations

Patient Information Forum (PIF)

483 Green Lanes, London  N13 4BS

Last week the parliamentary portfolio committee on health, discussing how the Department of Health had spent its budget in the 2014-2015 financial year, said it spent 83% of a R76- million grant aimed at improving medicine supply and providing primary health care. It also spent only 21% of a second grant of R388-million. The 2014-2015 under-expenditure equalled R305-million – up from a R291-million under-expenditure in the 2013-2014 financial year….more

USAID’s flagship Maternal and Child Survival Program (MCSP) along with World Health Organization is excited to introduce our latest evidence brief, WHO Recommendations for Prevention and Treatment of Maternal Peripartum Infections.

This evidence brief provides highlights and key messages from World Health Organization’s recommendations for prevention and treatment of maternal peripartum infections, including policy and program implications for translating the guidelines into action at the country level. The ultimate goal of the WHO recommendations is to improve quality of care and to reduce preventable death and disability associated with peripartum infection for mothers and newborns. This brief is intended for policy-makers, programme managers, educators and providers.

Find the brief here – http://bit.ly/1L8O1Zv

Help us spread the word to others by sharing this email with your networks and sending out a message on social media.

Here are sample Twitter messages that you and your organizations can use. Share these messages yourself or forward this email to your communications / social media staff.

See @MCSPglobal brief w/ key msgs from @WHO’s recs for prevention & treatment of maternal peripartum infections http://bit.ly/1L8O1Zv

Bacterial infection around time of birth acct for 1/10 of #maternal deaths. Learn more from @WHO & @MCSPglobal brief  http://bit.ly/1L8O1Zv

A third of physicians in Egyptian university hospitals reported ‘feeling knowledge gap every day’ and this was associated with positive attitude towards evidence-based medicine and was also positively associated with the ability to answer questions related to critical reading of literature. (Beware the physician who thinks s/he knows it all.)

Below is the citation and abstract. Unfortunately the full text is restricted-access.

CITATION: J Egypt Public Health Assoc. 2015 Sep;90(3):115-120.

Critical thinking and attitude of physicians toward evidence-based medicine in Alexandria, Egypt.

Shehata GM1, Zaki A, Dowidar NL, El Sayed I.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Evidence-based practice is important for developing countries and is expected to thrive in a questioning culture. Experienced physicians differ in the making of clinical judgements, which are often not based on evidence. Although this topic is of paramount importance to the quality of care provided in the university hospitals in Alexandria, little research has been done about attitudes towards evidence-based medicine (EBM), and the extent of physicians’ skills to access and interpret evidence.

OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to investigate the relation between the attitude towards EBM and the indicators for questioning mind and critical appraisal skills among physicians in Alexandria, Egypt.

PARTICIPANTS AND METHODS: In a cross-sectional study, physicians (N=549) were randomly selected from different clinical departments in three of the university hospitals in Alexandria, Egypt using the stratified proportionate random sampling technique. A self-administrated questionnaire modified from the questionnaire used by McColl and colleagues was used.

RESULTS: A high percentage of physicians (83%) had positive attitude towards EBM. Feeling knowledge gap every day was reported by 34.2% of the physicians while 55.6% felt knowledge gap less frequently. The percentage of physicians who understood the meaning of different measures used to assess the importance of results and quality of evidence in meta-analysis studies ranged from 10.8 to 24.2%. Higher frequency of feeling knowledge gap in clinical practice and the ability to correctly answer different questions reflecting critical reading skills were all significantly associated with positive attitude towards EBM (P<0.05). A significant association (P<0.05) was also found between the frequency of feeling knowledge gap and the ability to answer questions related to critical reading of literature.

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS: This study has identified a significant relation between critical thinking skills and having a positive attitude towards EBM among physicians in the university hospitals in Alexandria. The study supported the hypothesis that strategies that encouraging critical thinking in medical education could improve the attitude of physicians towards EBM. Adopting teaching methods that encourage critical thinking in medical education as well as including the concepts and principals of critical appraisal of scientific research in the syllabus of both undergraduate and postgraduate medical students are recommended.

—

Let’s build a future where people are no longer dying for lack of healthcare knowledge – Join HIFA: www.hifa2015.org

Thanks to Irina Ibraghimova and the LRC Network I have just learned about this new online IACAPAP Textbook of Child and Adolescent Mental Health. It looks very impressive; it is free to download and use offline; and it includes PowerPoint slides for teaching. Furthermore the publication is *open-access*. And it includes a quote from HIFA on its title page. Congratulations to the International Association for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Allied Professions for their generous contribution to child and adolescent mental health.

(By contrast, we have been trying unsuccessfully for several years to persuade the Royal College of Psychiatrists to make their publication Where There is No Psychiatrist freely available to all. This book is still needed as it is specifically for primary health workers in low-resource settings, yet ironically it is out of reach to most of those who would benefit from it, thereby failing to benefit the millions of people worldwide whose mental health depends on such health workers.)

You can freely access and download all chapters and PPTs of the new textbook here: http://iacapap.org/iacapap-textbook-of-child-and-adolescent-mental-health

Comments on IACAPAP textbook:

“A work that rivals standard textbooks in scope; takes full advantage of its online format to include an array of color pictures, graphics, and video links; and gives voice to a medley of specialists, patients, and commentators from Amsterdam to Ankara, Beijing to Berlin…”

Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry

“Each chapter is scholarly written, clinically oriented and of immense relevance to the practice of child and adolescent mental health… Some striking features set this work apart from traditional textbooks.”

Australasian Psychiatry

With best wishes,

Neil

Let’s build a future where people are no longer dying for lack of healthcare knowledge – Join HIFA: www.hifa2015.org  

This week’s print issue of The Lancet (14 November) carries the final report of The Rockefeller Foundation–Lancet Commission on Planetary Health. The authors define planetary health as: “The achievement of the highest attainable standard of health, wellbeing, and equity worldwide through judicious attention to the human systems—political, economic, and social—that shape the future of humanity and the Earth’s natural systems that define the safe environmental limits within which humanity can flourish. Put simply, planetary health is the health of human civilisation and the state of the natural systems on which it depends”.

Here are the key messages of the report:

1. The concept of planetary health is based on the understanding that human health and human civilisation depend on flourishing natural systems and the wise stewardship of those natural systems. However, natural systems are being degraded to an extent unprecedented in human history.

2. Environmental threats to human health and human civilisation will be characterised by surprise and uncertainty. Our societies face clear and potent dangers that require urgent and transformative actions to protect present and future generations.

3. The present systems of governance and organisation of human knowledge are inadequate to address the threats to planetary health. We call for improved governance to aid the integration of social, economic, and environmental policies and for the creation, synthesis, and application of interdisciplinary knowledge to strengthen planetary health.

4. Solutions lie within reach and should be based on the redefinition of prosperity to focus on the enhancement of quality of life and delivery of improved health for all, together with respect for the integrity of natural systems. This endeavour will necessitate that societies address the drivers of environmental change by promoting sustainable and equitable patterns of consumption, reducing population growth, and harnessing the power of technology for change.

Here is a selected extract of particular relevance to HIFA:

‘The final priority for research should be to prioritise translational research and implementation science to address the on-the-ground realities of what is feasible and relevant in the settings facing the greatest threats to planetary health. The dissemination, communication, and implementation of knowledge has to be central to research. Research can and does end up with recommendations that cannot to be translated into policy and action because the research did not fully capture the barriers to policy and behavioural change and how to address them. An unacceptable gap exists between the unprecedented amount of knowledge of diseases (including their control) and the implementation of that knowledge, especially in poor countries. Directed and innovative research is needed to analyse the causes of this situation and to point toward solutions at the global and local levels, both within and outside the health sector.’

CITATION: Safeguarding human health in the Anthropocene epoch: report of The Rockefeller Foundation–Lancet Commission on planetary health

Dr Sarah Whitmee, PhD, Prof Andy Haines, FMedSci, Prof Chris Beyrer, MD, Frederick Boltz, PhD, Prof Anthony G Capon, PhD, Braulio Ferreira de Souza Dias, PhD, Alex Ezeh, PhD, Howard Frumkin, MD, Prof Peng Gong, PhD, Peter Head, BSc, Richard Horton, FMedSci, Prof Georgina M Mace, DPhil, Robert Marten, MPH, Samuel S Myers, MD, Sania Nishtar, PhD, Steven A Osofsky, DVM, Prof Subhrendu K Pattanayak, PhD, Montira J Pongsiri, PhD, Cristina Romanelli, MSc, Agnes Soucat, PhD, Jeanette Vega, MD, Derek Yach, MBChB

The Lancet Volume 386, No. 10007, p1973–2028, 14 November 2015

http://thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(15)60901-1/fulltext

(free access after free registration)

Best wishes, Neil

Let’s build a future where people are no longer dying for lack of healthcare knowledge – Join HIFA: www.hifa2015.org  

‘CASP The Critical Appraisal Skills Program is an efficient way to look at a paper and now you don’t need to use forms or papers to do this if you have an iphone because (CASPe) has created a CASP app for that.’

http://www.ithinkwell.org/free-casp-iphone-app-for-critical-appraisal-skills/

‘CASP now has a great easy to use mobile app that is free for iphone. With this app you can appraise eight kinds of studies. The app will store your results and it is easy to use even while sitting in a conference or a classroom. The CASP app was built for the iphone but mine works on the ipad too. The CASP app comes in English and Spanish. It takes minutes to do an appraisal and yet CASP leaves the work to you. The CASP developers offer expert tools for the job in a simple easy to use format. The app prompts you to create a title for your journal article review, add the PubMed ID or link and select the appropriate CASP worksheet (eight different study design options are included). CASP contains an outstanding A-Z Evidence Based Practice glossary and a section called Calculators that you can use to work out a number needed to treat (NNT) and pretest probabilities. If you need more guidance you can always get this from the CASP website and if you are Spanish see the critical appraisal program in Spain (CASPe) The Spanish group were the app creators lead by Dr Juan Cabello’.

—

Best wishes, Neil

Let’s build a future where people are no longer dying for lack of healthcare knowledge – Join HIFA: www.hifa2015.org  

Below is the citation and abstract of a new paper by HIFA member Eric Friedman and Lawrence Gostin.

Full text is freely available here: http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10728-015-0307-x

CITATION: Imagining Global Health with Justice: In Defense of the Right to Health

Eric A. Friedman, Lawrence O. Gostin

Health Care Analysis, December 2015, Volume 23, Issue 4, pp 308-329

Published online: October, 2015

ABSTRACT

The singular message in Global Health Law is that we must strive to achieve global health with justice—improved population health, with a fairer distribution of benefits of good health. Global health entails ensuring the conditions of good health—public health, universal health coverage, and the social determinants of health—while justice requires closing today’s vast domestic and global health inequities. These conditions for good health should be incorporated into public policy, supplemented by specific actions to overcome barriers to equity.

A new global health treaty grounded in the right to health and aimed at health equity — a Framework Convention on Global Health (FCGH) — stands out for its possibilities in helping to achieve global health with justice.

This far-reaching legal instrument would establish minimum standards for universal health coverage and public health measures, with an accompanying national and international financing framework, require a constant focus on health equity, promote Health in All Policies and global governance for health, and advance the principles of good governance, including accountability.

While achieving an FCGH is certainly ambitious, it is a struggle worth the efforts of us all. The treaty’s basis in the right to health, which has been agreed to by all governments, has powerful potential to form the foundation of global governance for health. From interpretations of UN treaty bodies to judgments of national courts, the right to health is now sufficiently articulated to serve this role, with the individual’s right to health best understood as a function of a social, political, and economic environment aimed at equity. However great the political challenge of securing state agreement to the FCGH, it is possible.

States have joined other treaties with significant resource requirements and limitations on their sovereignty without significant reciprocal benefits from other states, while important state interests would benefit from the FCGH. And from integrating the FCGH into the existing human rights system to creative forms of compliance and enforcement and strengthened domestic legal and political accountability mechanisms, the treaty stands to improve right to health compliance. The potential for the FCGH to bring the right to health nearer universal reality calls for us to embark on the journey towards securing this global treaty.

Best wishes, Neil

Let’s build a future where people are no longer dying for lack of healthcare knowledge – Join HIFA: www.hifa2015.org

The Wellcome Trust has polled people in the UK about their beliefs and knowledge of antibiotics and antibiotic resistance. ‘The aim was to get a deep understanding of how people think and feel about

antibiotics, their current understanding of the resistance issue and the language they use around this area – how they talk about it and what words they use.’

Some of the key findings are shown below. The full text is available here:

http://www.wellcome.ac.uk/stellent/groups/corporatesite/@policy_communications/documents/web_document/wtp059551.pdf

Most people think they know when they need antibiotics – they don’t need the doctor to tell them

The deciding factor is nearly always how ill they feel – it’s about severity rather than type of illness

And this means there is a strong sense of ‘validation’ connected to antibiotics – getting them is ‘proof’ you’re ill

And ‘resistance’ is either not on the radar or misunderstood – everyone assumes it’s the person that becomes resistant

And there’s a belief that ‘they’/ scientists will sort it out before it becomes a real problem

All of which means it’s really hard to make it feel relevant to the individual

When people really understand resistance and ‘get it’ it makes a difference – but it’s really difficult to grasp

—

The bottom line is clarity and directness. As in: “Bacteria are getting stronger. Antibiotics won’t work anymore. You could die.” The Atlantic

The authors of the above study say we should stop talking about ‘antibiotic resistance’ and instead talk about ‘antibiotic-resistant infections’.

‘There is a need for a communications campaign for the public which makes the issue feel real and relevant, so that the tide of opinion is behind taking action.’

It seems highly likely that these misperceptions apply not only in the UK but in all countries.

Best wishes, Neil

Let’s build a future where people are no longer dying for lack of healthcare knowledge – Join HIFA: www.hifa2015.org  

Improving nutrition outcomes with better water, sanitation, and hygiene: Practical solutions for policy and programmes, 2015. WHO/USAID/UNICEF.

The report is on the WHO website

http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/193991/1/9789241565103_eng.pdf

This document provides an overview of the evidence of nutrition gains that can be achieved with improved WASH, a description of key WASH practices, and practical knowledge and guidance on how to integrate WASH into nutrition programmes, including important monitoring and evaluation (M&E) aspects. The document concludes by providing a suite of case-studies and lessons learnt in ntegrating WASH with nutrition efforts.

This publication is intended primarily for nutrition programme managers and implementers working in developing countries who are seeking information about key WASH interventions that support nutritional outcomes, how to integrate such interventions into nutrition programmes, and related M&E considerations.

An important secondary audience is WASH programme managers and implementers who will find models and platforms at the household, health care facility and community levels for supporting integration efforts and establishing partnerships across sectors.

Finally, this publication can be useful for governments, donors, foundations and nongovernmental

organizations (NGOs) that are seeking to maximize health gains through greater integration and joint monitoring of nutrition and WASH efforts.

—

Let’s build a future where people are no longer dying for lack of healthcare knowledge – Join HIFA: www.hifa2015.org  

“We are speeding up the process dramatically by using antibiotics too much and often in the wrong contexts” says Marc Sprenger, Director of the WHO’s secretariat for antimicrobial resistance. His commentary is published today by WHO: http://www.who.int/mediacentre/commentaries/stop-antibiotic-resistance/en/

The prescription for action from WHO starts as follows:

‘Doctors, nurses, veterinarians and other health workers: Don’t prescribe or dispense antibiotics unless they are truly necessary and you have made all efforts to test and confirm which antibiotic your human patient or the animal you are treating should have. Today, it is estimated that in half of all cases, antibiotics are prescribed for conditions caused by viruses, where they do no good. You can also do more to prevent infections in the first place by ensuring your hands, instruments and environment are clean, and employing vaccines where appropriate.’

‘People using healthcare: Take antibiotics only when prescribed by a certified health professional, but also don’t be timid about asking if you feel you really need them. If you take an antibiotic, always complete the full prescription, even if you feel better, because stopping treatment early promotes the growth of drug-resistant bacteria.’

Yes, but I would emphasise that access to reliable information on medicines, in a form that is readily understandable, is a fundamental prerequisite for the above (both for health professionals and the general public). Given the enormity of the global threat of antimicrobial resistance, it is hard to understand why Information on Medicines For All is not seen as a priority. I was saddened and surprised to learn recently that the International Network for the Rational Use of Drugs have virtually ceased operations due to lack of funding. Who is now leading on this issue?

For more information on Information on Medicines for All, and the HIFA Working Group on Information for Prescribers and Users of Medicines, see:

http://www.hifa2015.org/prescribers-and-users-of-medicines/

Best wishes, Neil

Let’s build a future where people are no longer dying for lack of healthcare knowledge – Join HIFA: www.hifa2015.org  

To help attract and retain the ‘right’ graduates to the rural workforce and mitigate the ongoing rural doctor workforce shortage, this study compares demographic, temperament and character trait profiles of general practice Registrars across three Australian training pathways. The combination of trait levels that tend to differentiate Registrars on a rural path correlate strongly with high levels of resilience, which may be of greater benefit for the rural context.

http://www.rrh.org.au/articles/showarticlenew.asp?ArticleID=3426

‘Economists from 44 countries call on global policy makers to prioritise a pro-poor pathway to universal health coverage (UHC) as an essential pillar of development.’

Below are extracts from the declaration in this week’s issue of The Lancet (21 November):

‘UHC means ensuring that everyone can obtain essential health services at high quality without suffering financial hardship. Resource constraints require individual countries to determine their own definition of “essential”…’

‘The success of the next development chapter hinges on the ability to actually deliver proven health solutions to the poorest and most marginalised populations…’

‘Every country has the opportunity to achieve UHC…’

‘We, the undersigned, therefore urge that:

– Heads of government increase domestic funds for convergence and provide vocal political leadership to implement policy reforms toward pro-poor UHC

– Donor countries meet their pledges for international development assistance and commit to investing in the global functions of DAH, particularly research and development for diseases of poverty

– Development financing discussions explicitly address equity, including who pays domestically and who benefits

– National policy makers embrace UHC, as defined above, as an integrated approach for measuring progress toward health targets in the post-2015 global development framework.’

Best wishes, Neil

Let’s build a future where people are no longer dying for lack of healthcare knowledge – Join HIFA: www.hifa2015.org  

You may be interested in a training methodology which uses participatory activities to ‘translate’ medical terminology for LMIC health programmes and low literacy contexts.  For example, to explain immune function, viral load, HIV mutation and why treatment adherence is vital, patients or community members wearing “White Blood Cell”, “HIV”, “Infection”, and “ARV” masks are involved in role playing the interactions between these different characters.  www.boht.org includes a short video with clips of this and related activities being used in health education programmes throughout Africa.  

6th November 2015

Dear Sir / Madam,

INVITATION TO PARTICIPATE/SEND DELEGATES TO THE 9TH NIGERIAN CONFERENCE ON TELEMEDICINE AND eHealth (NICTe2015)

The Society for Telemedicine and eHealth in Nigeria, SfTeHIN exists to facilitate the international dissemination of knowledge and experience in Telemedicine and eHealth, and to provide access to recognized experts in the field worldwide. This responsibility she has carried out successfully in last ten years through numerous activities including annual conferences, and workshops as well as collaboration with relevant stakeholders in Nigeria.

In keeping with our tradition, this year’s annual conference, the 9th Nigerian Conference on Telemedicine and eHealth (NICTe2015) is scheduled to take place from 3rd – 4th December 2015 at the Banquet Hall of the National Center for Women Development, Tafawa Balewa Street, Central Business District in Abuja Nigeria. With the theme “The Business of eHealth”, the two-day event scientific conference cum exhibition will also mark in a special way, the 10th anniversary of SFTeHIN. NICTe2015 will be the leading eHealth event in Africa to share knowledge and experiences from across the country on actual solutions, technologies, products and services. It will also be a formidable platform for networking and engagement.

Towards this end, we are pleased to invite you to participate in the conference as a delegate by sponsoring yourself to the conference, and a stakeholder by sponsoring at least 3 persons from your organization to attend the event.

Your participation will once again reinforce your institution’s commitment to actualizing the vision for improvement in our health sector. Conference fee, Speaking/Sponsorship /Exhibition opportunities and other details are available at www.sftehin.ng. We therefore eagerly expect your favourable response to our invitation.

Yours faithfully,

Dr Olajide Adebola

President, Society for Telemedicine and eHealth